Artist Silke Lapina Blurs the Lines Between Scripture and Pop Music

One Saturday afternoon, inside the Edoweird Gallery in Katipunan, the German-Filipino artist Silke Lapina stood above a shallow strip of water. She was barefoot, wearing a black suit, and in front of her was Father Joseph San Jose of Metropolitan Community Church Open Table in a rainbow stole. A soft purple neon light bathed the room. Solemn harmonies from the UP Singing Ambassadors filled the air, an a cappella rendition of Jessa Zaragoza’s “Bakit Pa” echoed through the gallery like a sacred chant.

“Silke, is it your genuine and personal desire to renew and re-affirm your baptism today?” the pastor asked. 

“Yes, I do,” she replied.

“We begin by reconfirming your baptismal vows through a series of questions. Do you reject Satan and all that is evil and the works of evil (whether Satan is symbolic or an entity or both) including homophobia, transphobia, intolerance, prejudice, intolerance, and abuse, and all forms of harm, hatred, violence, and exploitation that destroy both human life and dignity, and destroy all of God’s creation?”

“Yes, I do,” she answered.

It was a scene that blurred the lines between sincerity and performance, the holy and the everyday.

Through the Fire

A month before, I sat with Lapina at the Airbnb she fashioned into her studio. She just came from an exhibition in Thailand and was knee-deep in preparing for “Bakit Pa,” her first solo show in the Philippines. All around the room were her mirrors personally hand-engraved with text in the style of medieval script.

“I’ve been doing this engraving work for a few years now, forging profane text but also sacred text,” she said. “Some of the texts, they’re kind of bastos even though they’re from the Bible, and some of the quotes that look like they’re from a prayer, they’re from a pop song.” She’d put them next to each other and it’d get people to start asking, “What’s sacred? What’s everyday life?”

She pointed to one that says “nakatago na, nababasa pa.” It’s a riddle that she found intriguing. “It’s kind of spicy. You’re hiding, and you’re wet,” she laughed. Another mirror simply says “23,” which is both a magic number and a reference to Eraserheads frontman Ely Buendia’s favorite Bible passage, Psalms 23.

Lapina’s work is deeply informed by spirituality, and she considers herself to be deeply spiritual. She meditates every day and regularly visits a Carmelite monastery. For her anthropology thesis as an undergraduate, she studied a Pentecostal migrant Filipino church in Vienna. She’s Christian, but she’s also a critical person. She’s quick to say that there isn’t only one truth. Her father was a German Freemason and her mother is a Filipino Roman Catholic, and it was important for her father that Lapina had a choice in what she believed in. He passed away when she was 14 and that loss led her to question a lot of things, explore different beliefs, and go on a spiritual journey. 

In Berlin, while studying at Humboldt University’s theological faculty for her master’s degree in religion and culture, she encountered the works of medieval mystic Meister Eckhart. “Find God in everything. You don’t need to go to church,” she explained, quoting Eckhart. “That was quite a spicy thing to say at the time,” she said. But really, it was about being present. “Try to really open up, really be present, and that’s it. You’ll experience some sacredness in your life today.”

That became foundational to her artistic practice. Her works dance around the interplay of the sacred and profane, finding spirituality in everyday life. This is why she quotes both scripture and pop culture and why she believes pop songs can be prayer.

“What is a prayer, really?” she asked, noting how Nina’s cover of “Through The Fire” can be one if it’s sung with all of one’s heart. “Let a pop song be a prayer.”

As such, her artistic practice is a spiritual and meditative process; it’s akin to how medieval monks copy religious manuscripts to show their devotion to God. Erwin Romulo, who curated “Bakit Pa,” pointed out that it would be infinitely easier for Lapina to laser-cut text instead of hand-engraving them. “But that’s not the point,” he said. “She has to physically do it herself, painstakingly.”

All at Once

Finding God in everything is deeply reminiscent of animism, said Carl Cervantes, a researcher on Filipino indigenous psychology and spirituality, and one of Lapina’s collaborators for “Bakit Pa.” “Animism is really just finding the spirit in everything that non-human life is also valuable, and we see this in Western philosophy. It’s also the deep ecology movement, which is more nature-based, more towards caring for creatures that are not just human. The idea is that humans are not the most important, but are part of a larger system that we share.”

In the Philippines, it is common to see indigenous rituals co-existing with Christian practices. Cervantes stressed that this is different from pure traditions blending together, or syncretism. “It’s about localization. Filipinos have always adapted foreign symbols — Christian, Chinese feng shui — into a deeply animist framework. Folk Catholicism is really Christianized animism. We use imagery to express an indigenous worldview. This has been true since the Spanish era when Filipinos turned Latin prayers into orasyon, a continuation of the pre-colonial practice of bulong or whispered prayers.”

“It’s not about mixing traditions; it’s about expressing spiritual power in ways that feel authentic,” Cervantes concluded. It echoed something that Lapina had pointed out separately: “I find it so relieving here that people can embrace multiple beliefs at once. Many homes have altars for different faiths in the same room, and it’s just normal.”

Of course, there is a darker side to it. “It’s all tied to colonialism — the attempt to preserve your actual beliefs within an oppressive system,” remarked Lapina.

“I just had a weird feeling of coming to the Philippines and being all about progressive theology, then being exposed to all these belief systems,” Lapina shared. “It kind of makes me angry and it hurts me, but… I can’t verbalize it right now. I don’t know.”

The New and Old

Walking through the “Bakit Pa” exhibit feels strange, yet familiar. “It’s really constructed like a chapel,” Romulo said. The light reflected from the mirrors is reminiscent of the stained glass windows of a church. The pieces are laid out like the stations of the cross. Hildegard von Bingen mixed with contemporary songs play in the background. 

“The main goal with every exhibition for me is to create a certain vibe,” Lapina said. “For this exhibition, I wanted to create a neo-cathedral vibe. You would enter and say, ‘Oh, okay, it’s kinda like a church.’ Not really; it’s modern, but you can feel the spirit in the room.”

Every corner of the exhibit has significance. The purple light emanating from the water shifts ever so slightly. In the Christian tradition, the color represents silence, transition, and repentance. Everything corresponds to something in the Catholic Church, Romulo said. “You have a name, you have an altar, and, of course, a cross.” The cross, which is a giant Greek cross, is the exhibit’s main centerpiece. Inscribed on it is a letter written by Lapina’s friend, Tim. “He wrote this love letter about his affair with a man,” Lapina said. “There’s so much desire in that text, but it’s a love letter, actually. But when I was reading it, I was like, Tim, this is like a prayer as well.” Part of it reads:

“There is no possession of you. Only the image, the moment, everything out of the sand of you that sits between my fingers, with every touch, every moment, every kiss. The light you burn cannot burn brightly enough. There is no satisfaction in infinite desire. And, I can only desire, desire, desire you, and your body, and your presence, and everything you have to say, and all that you are not. More and more, every time I see you, and even more when I do not see you. Even more when I do not see you. Even more and even more. It eats away at me, at me, at me like a hunger. A thirst that will never be sated. I could spend my life with you and could give you enough.”

“Queer theology is one part of what Silke wants to highlight,” Romulo said. “It’s one of the contemporary heresies of our age development… We’re connecting old heretical thought with new heretical thought.”

He continued: “There’s so many more things you can do with Christian belief, in thinking and traditions, than we’ve been led to believe.”

A Real Ritual

So, why the baptism renewal at the exhibit, and why with a queer church?

“It’s personal and, at the same time, an artistic expression,” Lapina said, “but also a political statement.” 

When Lapina was young, maybe age three or four, her mother had her secretly baptized while on a holiday in the Philippines. Her father, who urged her religious autonomy, was against it. Still, her mother did it because “for her, if the kid is not baptized, then it means I’m not protected,” she said.

And so, the baptism renewal is a more deliberate and conscious act of faith. “Baptized as an infant, she wanted to renew her Christian baptism more intentionally as a queer person bringing with her the depth of her own experiences, personal theological insights, and expressed fully in and with her art,” says Father Joseph San Jose.

The MCC Open Table Church was also an intentional choice. She had already been working with progressive, queer-affirming religious communities in Berlin, so she wanted to find a similar one in Manila. “I think it’s important to advocate for that kind of community, even if it’s small,” she said.

Lady Gaga and Adele often play during Communion at MCC Open Table, reinforcing the idea that God can speak through all forms of human expression. “For us, the Holy Spirit speaks through the songs of Lady Gaga, Adele, Wicked,” said Father San Jose. “Some people are both confused and touched by it. But theology tells us God is in everything.”

Progressive churches have always emerged in response to injustice and oppression, said Father San Jose. “You can trace them throughout the history of Christianity. When the Roman Catholic Church became abusive and corrupt during the Middle Ages, reformers like Martin Luther, John Calvin, and Ulrich Zwingli challenged its authority, leading to the rise of Protestant churches and democratizing access to the Bible. The Philippine Independent Church, also known as the Aglipayan Church, was born out of the earliest labor movements in the Philippines and was deeply connected to the Katipunan and the Philippine Revolution. Black churches in America rose as a response to racial oppression and segregation. Liberation theology in Latin America emerged as a response to systemic injustices in the region.”

This idea is deeply embedded in the faith itself. “Jesus was not only seen as a progressive but also as a blasphemer, and he was crucified for it,” Father San Jose pointed out. “His early followers — poor peasants, farmers, fisherfolk, and slaves — formed communities that eventually became the first churches.”

With all that said, Father San Jose stressed that the baptism renewal was real and authentic. “I was clear with Silke that I will not do any ritual of renewing baptism if this is just ‘for show’ and artistic controversy. I am willing to officiate this in the truth and sincerity of what she told me as her reasons and motivations,” he said.

“Of course, people are free to interpret it as they want,” he said later after the baptism. “But from the one who’s requesting it and from the ones who appreciate the ritual, we have to be clear why we are doing it.” He emphasized that rituals, while performative, are not performances. “The intention is not to entertain. The intention is not even to appeal to emotions. The object of the ritual is always God.”

When I had broached the question, Lapina cheekily noted, “I also thought that it’s quite a dramatic outing. ‘Okay, girl. You really need a baptism in the gallery just to say you’re queer.’”