Kidlat TAHIMIK

Born 1942 in Baguio, Philippines
Based in Baguio, Philippines

Studied Speech and Drama at the University of the Philippines in 1963 and earned an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in 1967, but in 1972 tore up his diploma and became an artist. In 1977, his debut work, Perfumed Nightmare (1977) won the International Critics Award at the Berlin International Film Festival. Since the 1970s he has consistently cast suspicion and a critical gaze on Western modernist culture from the point of view of Asia, where he was born, while building a career as a pioneering independent filmmaker. At the same time he has also turned his hand to performance and installation art, establishing himself as a flexible and prolific multi-talented artist whose work is not limited to the medium of film. Inspired by the theory that the first person to circumnavigate the globe was not Magellan, who died midway through his final voyage, but a slave from Malacca, Tahimik's latest feature film, Balikbayan #1 Memories of Overdevelopment Redux III, is a unique work that, due to the time it took to shoot, is also impressed with the actual life of the artist.