Photograph of Gerardo Tan's work, 3 Unknown Objects by Roberto Chabet, in the group exhibition, 'Authenticity,' curated by Boots Herrera and Ana Labrador at the Cultural Center of the Philippines Small Gallery in September 2000.

For this exhibition, 'the original idea was for Gerardo Tan to deliberately copy the work of Roberto Chabet with his consent. As it turned out, both artists turned out with copies of each others' works, producing a collaborative installation of two related works.'

Gerardo Tan's work refers to Chabet's Unknown Objects, exhibited in 1969 at Joy Dayrit's Print gallery as part of 'Words and Pictures,' an exhibition of works that accompanied poems by Filipino poets chosen by the participating artists. Chabet's work consisted of three bell jars on the floor without an accompanying text. He said it was a work 'in search of a text - maybe a yet to be written poem.' In retrospect, he said, 'Perhaps the title or label was text enough.'

Roberto Chabet's work, Remains to be seen..., footnotes Gerardo Tan's copy. The work quotes the beeswax found objects in Tan's Recent Diggings (1993) and references the sense of foundness and loss in the burning wax Virgin of Apparition (1999), the missing person of NOTHERE (1998), and the negative ID photos of Meetings (2000).