All Stories

Everything we've published, newest first.

Spanish artist Ginés Serrán works on the face of his full scale clay model of General Martín Delgado on horseback, later cast in bronze for Iloilo, in a studio with tall windows

The sad, extraordinary tale of a general in the Revolución exiled as a ‘leper,’ as told by a Spanish artist

Spanish artist Ginés Serrán on sculpting a bronze monument in Iloilo for General Martín Delgado, the revolutionary hero exiled to Culion.

By Igan D'Bayan · October 24, 2016
Parody of Steely Dan’s The Royal Scam album cover, retitled Cthulhu: The Royal Scam, a suited Cthulhu-headed sleeper on a ledge beneath skyscrapers topped with snarling beasts

Even further adventures in hi-fi: Or ‘You zombie be born again, my friend’

Speakers heavy as a monolith, vinyl drops at six in the morning, and a Hong Kong audio show where Jeff Buckley never really died

By Igan D'Bayan · October 9, 2016
Snow-capped Himalayan peaks floating above haze behind a forested hillside village in morning light

The day I got high at the Himalayas

A Himalayan sunrise from a windy hotel terrace in Nagarkot, thangka brushes of a single hair, and an open-air cremation on the Bagmati.

By Igan D'Bayan · February 15, 2015
Bob Feleo in a white shirt looking up at his life-size bark-textured figure with a flame for a head, arms raised over a wide circle of small clay balls on the gallery floor

A shot of Basi with Bob Feleo

‘I don’t believe in inspiration,’ says master sculptor Bob Feleo, on the Basi Revolt of 1807 and why art should provoke thought.

By Igan D'Bayan · January 26, 2015
The Taj Mahal at dusk, its white dome mirrored in a long reflecting pool lined with visitors

A tour of India’s Golden Triangle: Immortal beloved

Humanity divides in two, according to Vinee: those who have seen the Taj and those who have not. Seen from the tower where Shah Jahan ended.

By Igan D'Bayan · January 11, 2015
Rodel Tapaya in a cap and Marina Cruz in a grey suit, both in Art Fair Philippines 2020 exhibitor badges, smiling side by side in a gallery booth

Rodel Tapaya and Marina Cruz: Two for the road of art

Contemporary Filipino artists Rodel Tapaya and Marina Cruz on folklore, memory, and building an artistic life together in Bulacan.

By Igan D'Bayan · December 7, 2014
The Great Sphinx under scaffolding at Giza, with two pyramids rising in the distance

Rock of ages

Retracing the Holy Family’s flight through Egypt: cave churches, four monasteries in Wadi El Natrun, and a bible that floated up the Nile.

By Igan D'Bayan · November 23, 2014
A winged Cthulhu in a white dinner jacket salsa-steps across a lantern-lit rooftop café terrace, the Sphinx and the Pyramids of Giza glowing in Cairo’s sunset behind him

Salsa Night in the Land of Pharaohs

We are really nowhere men after a hard day’s night, but at this hour, by the tomb of Tutankhamun, there shall be dancing.

By Igan D'Bayan · November 23, 2014
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band cover reimagined with modern rock stars around a floral ‘Music Is Life’ display

Get Your Kicks On Route 666

Noel Gallagher on his first guitar, the Cure’s longest set, a reporter who mistook Fergie for Apl.de.ap: an album of crazy diamonds met along the way.

By Igan D'Bayan · July 13, 2014
A technician in glasses works on the platter of a Technics SL-1200 turntable at a cluttered bench, surrounded by speakers, valve amplifiers and shelves of hi-fi gear

‘Rivo-lution’ no. 9

Rene Rivo is the Yoda of audio. The man behind Hyperaudio on hotrodding tube amps, tweaking Thorens turntables, and why vinyl never quite died.

By Igan D'Bayan · May 17, 2014
Parody of the Led Zeppelin IV album cover: a framed painting on a peeling wall of a robed Cthulhu-headed figure hunched under a bundle of audio cables

Further adventures in hi-fi: Or ‘And he’s buying a stereo to heaven’

Feel the derision of audiophiles once they find out you owned a piece of Bose equipment at any point in your life. It’s like the Mark of Cain.

By Igan D'Bayan · March 15, 2014
Dark illustration of a Scream-headed model maker painting a tiny graveyard diorama at a cluttered workbench, walls of numbered lit shadow boxes behind him under a sign reading 27 Dioramas of Horror Stories

27 or so encounters with the weird

Ghost sightings, haunted Parador hotels, and weird encounters in Malabon that prove the living are far scarier than the dead.

By Igan D'Bayan · July 28, 2013