PHASMAHAMMER: ONTO DECREATION

A paradigmatically queer assemblage of oneiric brutes “with intention to destroy,” Phasmahammer shows us what it means to decreate from within a Figure that opens up Themself to a pluriverse of incredible objects and equally impossible affects which in turn summons an “eco-cosmology” of imaginative reexistence.

What may seem as a bestiary at the outset only appears as such to piece out the rip-roaring terms of a biome of beings (Pinky, Sissy-Cyclo, Woulthum, Libulan) frenetically shape-seeking as they figure out the creatureliness of vitality itself, in the end. Even as, all throughout this decreative procedure, corporeal matter is derived from a conflation of, for example, “plastic and foam,” what still emerges is a pedagogy of natura naturans, nature naturing itself despite colonial-capitalist decimation (Phasmahammer proposes the crafting of their creatures through a prose that describes for example, Pinky incepted between larvation and pupation but also interrupted by technology sponsorship).

At the heart of this reverie is Phasmahammer’s projection of a “future folklore” that, while remembering an epic past, dispels romance with the archaic, by transfiguring time into the most confounding forms of a wildness to come, at the same time accounting for what co-presence, through a poetics of testimony, may perform for the collective, at the moment of performance.

Rooted in the queer ecosystem of Sydney, Phasmahammer’s fantastications enfold into their dreamwork the thrilling genealogies of a solidarity nurtured in both the shadow and shine of queer of colour poetics by turns accountable to their nostalgia but also wilfully clairvoyant in the imagineering. From The River Eats to Anito, and in between them, their masterwork Carrion, what Phasmahammer proposes is a speculative introspection on the antimatter of creation, often crafted through a keen commitment to nonbinary form.

Through a notion of theatre as live landscape breathtakingly concatenated if not altogether sutured from within a trans-creative methodology that consists of craft, prosthesis, sculpture and movement, Phasmahammer remains grounded in a “body-based practice” that explores an erotics of relation with an audience willing to be decreated themself while mesmerised along theatrical duress.

 Jaya Jacobo, Manila, October 2025

BIOGRAPHY /

Justin Talplacido Shoulder is a shape shifting artist and storyteller, working primarily in performance, sculpture, video and collective events. Also known as Phasmahammer, their practice is an eco-cosmology of alter personas based on queered ancestral myth. Creatures birthed are embodied through hand crafted costumes and prosthesis and animated by their own gestural languages. The artist uses their body and craft as an instrument of metaphysics towards a queer Filipinx Futurism. Shoulder believes in performance and shared ceremony as communal medicine for difficult times. 

Shoulder is a founding member of queer artist collective The Glitter Militia with partner and key collaborator Matthew Stegh. Over 12 years they co-created a series of events including Monsta Gras with Penelope Benton, an annual artist ball that aimed to reinvigorate the artistic and political intentions of the 78ers. A politicised avant-garde community led incubator for performance, music, visual art and dance for local and international LGBTQIA+ artists 2008-2020. 

Shoulder is also co-director of collective Club Ate with artist Bhenji Ra. Inspired by their shared Filipinx heritage and interest to create new narratives of motherhood and sisterhood the pair created a series of fundraisers, balls, and variety nights inviting and celebrating their local Asia-Pacific queer and trans family. This work extended into the film series Ex Nilalang Episodes 1-4:  2014-2017, and Ang Idol Ko: 2022 (highlights include Asia Pacific Triennial 2015, GOMA, screening at the Barbican, London, a finalist for Singapore Art Museum Prize and large scale projected and live activated work In Muva We Trust on the façade of the NGA, Canberra 2020).  

Shoulder’s theatre and visual art works have been presented across Australia and Internationally where they work between gallery, nightclub, and theatre contexts. Highlights include: La Manutention performance artist in residence at the Palais de Tokyo, Paris 2019, The Prague Quadrennial of Stage Design, 2019, Premiere of theatre work Carrion, Performance Space, Sydney (AUS) + subsequent tour to Artshouse, Melb (AUS), Fusebox Festival, Texas (USA), Museum Macan, Jakarta (IDN), Roskilde (DEN), Kampnagel, Hamburg (DE), Fierce Festival (UK), MAI, Montreal. 

New work has been commissioned recently for NIRIN Sydney Bienalle 2020, The National, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2021 and film work Ang Idol Ko, for MCA, Sydney / UCCA DUNE, Beidaihe, China 2022. Phasmahammer is currently working towards their new body of work Anito, a co-commission between Rising Festival, Melb, Sydney Festival and MONA premiering in 2023. A hybrid body of work for theatre, gallery and nightclub. 

In 2024 Shoulder’s collective Club Ate with collaborator Bhenji Ra were the recipient of the Creative Australia: Inspire Award