Pison 65 sub-genres). Her creations precede the labels which eventually become trademarks—the audience knows when a piece is a Locsin neo-ethnic or urbanative. As with the label “neo-ethnic,” the term “urbanative” came a bit after she had already begun re-working her neo-ethnic movements. She explains that it was Joey Ayala who once more provided her with a provocative term—“urbanatives.” Their collaborative work—with Ayala and Nonon Padilla—for Ballet Manila in 2003 carried the same title. She thought that the result of using modern day situations in interpreting ethnic rituals was not only “fascinating.” It was for her, the beginning of a clearer trajectory for her new project: the discovery of urbanative movement (Locsin forthcoming, n.p.). Thus, Ballet Manila’s URBANATIVES, an episodic choreography moving around urban life realities but with themes drawing from tribal dances of prayer, work, love, and war, perfectly embodied what she was doing in Davao. This was four years after Four Last Songs. Although her works in Davao revolved around contemporary issues, the Ballet Manila choreography which she considers modern and perhaps even neo-classical, was still characterized by movements reminiscent of tribal rituals and ethnic dances. It was in response to an interview question that asked her to label her post-1990s works that Locsin uttered “urbanative.” The term, as she recalls that interview, “sounded good” (Locsin, e-mail to author, July 24, 2011). Looking back at her 1990s choreographies, Locsin explains that the neo-ethnic vocabulary just was not successful in articulating both the current events of that decade and the concepts she was working on (Locsin, e-mail to author, July 24, 2011). The shift, or should we say “swing,” as Locsin still continued to create neo-ethic works in between—Sayaw sa Pamlang (2000), Senses (2000), Ritwal (2003), Agila (2003), Sayaw Pandirigma (2005), Balyan, Sayaw sa Labi (2006) Sayaw sa Karagatan (2006), Pitong Alay (2006)— may be read as part of the continuous quest of an artist for “identity.” Not that such identity was missing, because to begin with, she had found it her neo-ethnic. “Identity” in this sense, refers to a form or medium that an artist perpetually problematizes in response to his/her changing realities, national or otherwise. In the late 1990s, it was “ürbanative” that served as her chosen vocabulary to deal with a particular milieu, a milieu that she and her “aging bones” had to dialogue with. A little bit less energetic in that decade, Locsin could not engage in intense research and spend time in far flung areas of the Philippines. The immersion days of her neo-ethnic years had to be given up. In her words, “I felt it was time to slow down on neo-ethnic works since I was unable to do new things with it. I hate repeating myself ” (Locsin, e-mail to author July 24, 2011). In her remark, we get a glimpse of an artist consistently