2002
photography

“The poor words with which natural human speech is provided cannot suffice to describe the Madonna Inn.” (Umberto Eco, Travels in Hyperreality.)

The Madonna Inn is a pilgrimage for the imagination, a mental Mecca for California artists and retirees alike. Its opulent wonders suggest that our immediate realities are tentative, at best: between the walls of each compartmentalized theme room, fantasy and reality reconcile and cease to exist as contradictory states. For this reason, M.O.B. holds their annual strategic planning meetings here.

Printed and exhibited at the McColl Center for Visual Art in Charlotte in 2002, at Lizabeth Oliveria Gallery in San Francisco in 2003, and San Jose Museum of Art in 2013.

2013-ongoing
photo, video, performance

Manananggoogle’s mission is to organize the world and make it universally accessible and useful. With offices all around the globe, its headquarters remain in Mountain View, California. For more information, please visit the company website.

Certain circles in Silicon Valley have not taken kindly to this powerful company’s formidable influence, and nervous whispers abound. Manananggoogle’s founders and chief executive officers are sometimes rumored to in fact be the legendary, mythical Philippine manananggal.

Mananangoogle was commissioned by the San Jose Museum of Art with support from The James Irvine Foundation and MetLife Foundation.

The Tops: CEO R. Immaculata Estrada

The Tops: CTO E. Neneng Barrios

The Tops: CFO J. Baby Wofford

Manananggoogle: Conference

Manananggoogle: Break Time

Manananggoogle: Feeding

Manananggoogle: Fission

Manananggoogle: The Bottoms

2002
video

The world’s first, best, and perhaps only Southern Gothic, neo-noir, pseudo-silent karaoke horror film, Mail Order Bride of Frankenstein is the 3rd film in MOB’s Karaoke Trilogy. It was filmed entirely on location in the new-Romanesque former church now known as the McColl Center for Visual Art, in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Set to the classic feel-good sing-along “I Hate Myself For Loving You,” Mail Order Bride of Frankenstein serves as a chilling yet highly melodic parable on why it’s generally unwise to buy love online, some assembly required.

Poster

film still

film still

film still

film still

2002
McColl Center for Visual Art

Various activities, performances, screenings and shenanigans while artists-in-residence at the McColl Center for Visual Art in Charlotte, North Carolina.

McColl Center Residency

McColl Center Residency

McColl Center Residency

McColl Center Residency

McColl Center Residency

McColl Center Residency

McColl Center Residency

McColl Center Residency

McColl Center Residency

1999
installation

Prior to the closing of San Francisco’s original DeYoung Museum, curator Glen Helfand invited Bay Area artists to reflect on or “consider” the nature of a museum for a final exhibition entitled “Museum Pieces.”

MOB considered the question “Why are museums so cold, so uninviting and formal?” and endeavored to recreate the institution as a warmer, more hospitable living space. They surveyed visitors, and came up with highly appropriate decorating solutions for a section of the museum.