A person kicks a sipa during a performance of laro na tayo – let's play.

Photo credit: Ash Tanasiychuk

Artist-initiated project: laro na tayo – let’s play (2022) by Paul de Guzman

laro na tayo – let's play was a performance-based public artwork commissioned through our artist-initiated program, which invites artists to propose their own public artworks and sites throughout the city.

Presented at locations throughout Vancouver in 2022, laro na tayo – let's play was a series of socially engaged performances that invited participants to gather through the shared experience of play.

In the artist's words

"It's hard for me to convey the sense of curiosity and awe with the people I had the privilege of engaging with. laro na tayo – let's play is a humble and non-judgmental invitation to watch, play, and participate in an activity that unleashes the wonder of childhood play while softly musing on important issues that we face each day.

Performance art and social engagement is now recognized as a significant medium within public art and its discourse. If there's one thing the recent COVID-19 pandemic has taught us is our reliance on community, social engagement, and physical contact. As social creatures we rely on each other for support and care, and art can be the catalyst for that."

— Paul de Guzman

About laro na tayo – let's play
How sipa inspired the artwork

The work was inspired by sipa, a traditional Filipino game played by kicking a weighted shuttlecock-like object. Predating Spanish colonization of the Philippines, the game carries histories of cultural resilience, community, and movement. Through a series of performances, de Guzman used sipa as a point of departure to explore:
- Migration
- Settlement
- Multiculturalism
- Filipino Canadian identity
Inviting people to watch, learn, and participate

Part performance, part social practice, and part temporary installation, laro na tayo – let's play transformed everyday public spaces into places of encounter and exchange. Audience members were invited to watch, learn, and participate, creating opportunities for connection across cultures and generations.

Reflecting on migration and belonging

Drawing on childhood memories and community traditions, de Guzman's project considered how acts of play can carry personal and collective histories. The movement of the sipa through space became a metaphor for migration and belonging, inviting reflection on the experiences that shape communities and the ways cultural knowledge is shared over time.

Photograph by Ash Tanasiychuk.
Community performances in British Columbia

Following its presentation in Vancouver in 2022, laro na tayo – let's play continued as an evolving, community-engaged project throughout British Columbia.

In 2023, de Guzman brought the work to Bowen Island, Nanaimo, Prince George, and Victoria, expanding conversations around Filipino Canadian experience, cultural transmission, and belonging through participatory performances centred on the game of sipa.

Photograph by Ash Tanasiychuk.
Paul de Guzman's biography

Born in Manila, Philippines, and currently residing in Vancouver, Canada, Paul de Guzman's artistic practice is governed by nomadic gestures and transient objects, characterized by a concept-driven approach across a variety of media.

His artistic practice is post-studio and nomadic. His autodidactic education in art was achieved by reading art criticism and architectural texts. Working in media that is appropriate for each project — text, sculpture, installation, photography, video, performance, and social practice — an increasingly important outcome of his current investigations recognizes the roles of language, architecture, and social structures as control mechanisms.

His working method can be described as having an acute sensitivity toward an idea, a site, its public, and its surroundings, complemented by his interests in the dynamics of social interactions and postcolonial concerns.

MAA – Museum for the Administration of Aesthetics

In 2010, de Guzman initiated a virtual museum project called MAA – Museum for the Administration of Aesthetics. MAA is a nomadic and research-based entity that documents our engagement with art, architecture, and the urban environment. Through relational, linguistic, and documentary strategies, MAA utilizes various artistic methods to record and present an archive of urban and social experiences that engage contemporary ideas relating to urbanism and personal pedagogy.

MAA has collaborated on projects with Malaspina Printmakers Society in Vancouver, Stichting Duende in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and Fonderie Darling in Montreal. More recently, MAA launched the YouTube channel Paul presents ART, a weekly video digest of observations about art exhibitions and artistic engagements around the Greater Vancouver area and beyond.

Photograph by Ash Tanasiychuk.