AX Mina is an artist and culture writer exploring contemporary spirituality, technology and other sundry topics. She co-produces Five and Nine, a podcast about magic, work, and economic justice, and serves on the board of the Rabkin Foundation.
Art
MANILA, Philippines — The words “Catholic” and “Zen” rarely appear in the same sentence together, but there's a potent history of mixing of these traditions. Benedictine monk Thomas Merton famously studied Zen and Taoist classics as part of his meditative practice, and Zen Buddhist Thich Nhat Hanh h
Art
MANILA, Philippines — On November 23, 2009, just a little over two years ago, Esmael Magundadatu, the vice mayor of the southern Philippine city of Buluan, invited 37 journalists to accompany him as he filed for his certificate of candidacy. The group, along with a cadre of lawyers and family, never
Opinion
MANILA, Philippines — One of the lovely things about living abroad is seeing the American art world through the internet. When in the US, I'm tugged in so many directions from brick-and-mortar spaces, but there are a ton of American gems online, and not all of them are in New York and Los Angeles. L
Art
MANILA, Philippines — Where does one start with Philippine contemporary art? So little is known outside the country, even amongst foreign-born Filipinos.
Art
MANILA, Philippines — As is so often said about Chongqing, you've never heard of it, but with 30 million people and rising, it's one of the largest municipalities in the world (for perspective, all of New York state has some 20 million people). Located in the heart of southwest China, a former city
Art
MANILA, PHILIPPINES — What's up, Hyperallergic? I'm excited to begin blogging again more regularly this month. I've just landed in Manila, the bustling capital of the Philippines, to begin a month-long writing residency at Green Papaya Art Projects.
![Getting Naked for Ai Weiwei [NSFW]](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/size/w600/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2011/11/ainudity8-home.jpg)
Art
BEIJING — When Ai Weiwei's assistant, Beijing artist Zhao Zhao, was brought in for questioning recently, the supposed charges were simple: distribution of pornography. The image in question was "One Tiger, Eight Breasts," a shot of Ai with four young women, all of them naked. I first saw the photo i
Opinion
MANILA, PHILIPPINES — What has the response to Ai Weiwei's tax case been like in China? We've seen the thrilling surge of netizens lending over a million dollars to the artist, and he recently made a deposit while he contests the bill. The artist has returned to Twitter, posting actively once more.
Art
BEIJING — I moved to China almost a year ago now, into a country where I knew no one and where even the internet was foreign. I pulled away from my main social circle geographically, but did what I could do stay connected via the internet and phone. And yet, just as I turned to the internet for soci
Art
BEIJING — Anecdotally, Beijing, like New York, definitely feels like a city of immigrants and migrants. Few people I meet actually grew up in Beijing. For Beijing Design Week, Beijing artist Chen Ke partnered with Beijing curatorial lab ChART Contemporary to find a retro, more personal way to connec
Art
BEIJING — It's a four hour train from Seoul — two trains, to be precise, as a transfer is necessary. With a population of a little over a million people, it's the sixth-largest city in South Korea. That city is Gwangju, whose name means, literally, the bright province. It's a city of flashing neon l
Art
BEIJING — I arrived at Dongfeng Art District one afternoon, a 20-minute drive east of the more famous 798 and Caochangdi arts districts in northeast Beijing. It’s a short but somewhat winding drive away from the shinier parts of Chaoyang District, Beijing’s most economically-developed area. “Dongfeng” means “East Wind,