Warrnambool | A City for Living

Justin Shoulder

PHASMAHAMMER is the pseudonym of shape-shifting artist Justin Talplacido Shoulder. Working primarily in performance, sculpture, video and collective events Phasmahammer 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. P.H. believes in performance and shared ceremony as communal medicine for difficult times. 

P.H. is a founding member of queer artist collective The Glitter Militia (Monsta Gras, Pink Bubble) with partner and key collaborator Matthew Stegh and Club Ate with collaborator Bhenji Ra.  Their works have been presented across Australia and Internationally where they work between gallery, nightclub, theatre and cinema contexts. Recent performance 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), M+ (HK), Singapore Art Museum (SGD). Asia Pacfic Triennial 8 GOMA (AUS). In 2020 PHASMAHAMMER presented as part of the 22nd Biennale of Sydney: NIRIN, curated by Brook Andrew, and presented at The National 2021: New Australia Art.