Drawing inspiration from the concept of limits and an aim to gain an understanding of its nature is what prompted Lui Medina’s latest body of work titled ASCETICS(UNBOUND). In this show, she continues to delve deeper and investigate the metaphysical manifestation of simple objects, just as she has done in her past shows. The 30-year-old artist pursues this investigation not only through her artworks but also through the processes and materials used to create each piece. “Both material and the ritual of making are signifiers that attempt to verbalize the continuity and intimate relationships that take place,” Medina expounds.

ASCETICS(UNBOUND) features four pieces tediously crafted by the artist. Medina’s affinity to oval panels, which she has showed in past exhibitions, is once again evident in this display. She states, “I think there’s something about these shapes that allow me to see and treat my works as objects.” For this body of work, the UP Fine Arts and Slade School of Art graduate worked with oil and beeswax on gesso panels and genuine gold leaf. She also went the traditional way using a mixture of rabbit skin glue and chalk, working layer by layer, slowly building the surface to be painted on. Even bits of the red oil paint used in the artworks, she made herself. Bordering on sculptural pieces, it’s Medina’s interest in the idea and interpretation of her artworks as objects is what shines through.

Medina’s practice places itself on the thin line between the visible and invisible. The manifestation of being in that borderline position, such as tension and anxiety, is a recurring element in her work. It may as well be the driving force behind her practice and craft. It’s obvious that she has a deep interest in the process by which her art is created and the actual making of the pieces. Materials like beeswax, gold leaf, and oil are constant mediums Medina utilizes and starting points for ideas.

In addition, Medina shares, “The materiality of the immaterial, depth and transcendence creates the platform on which my enquiry lies and are, at the same time, the very ideas I question. Material is substance and significant, process and making are involvements, and all play a part in the effort to reach that state of sensory and psychological experience, both between the objects and themselves, and between the objects and spectators.

Medina is a Manila based full-time artist and part-time lecturer at the School of Design and Arts of De la Salle College of St. Benilde. ASCETICS(UNBOUND) is her eighth solo exhibition.

ASCETICS(UNBOUND) by Lui Medina opens on February 9, 2012 in 20Square, together with FROZEN ACTUALITIES by Rachel Rillo in Silverlens, and Carlos Celdran’s LIVIN LA VIDA IMELDA in SLab.

For inquiries, contact Silverlens Gallery at 2/F YMC Bldg. II, 2320 Pasong Tamo Ext., Makati, tel. no. 816- 0044, 0917-5874011, or manage@silverlensphoto.com.
Gallery hours are Monday to Friday 10am– 7pm and Saturdays 1-6pm. 
www.silverlensphoto.com  / slab.silverlensphoto.com

“I have a soft spot for secret passageways, bookshelves that open into silence, staircases that go down into a void, and hidden safes. I even have one myself, but I won’t tell you where.” 
-Luis Buñuel

Don’t believe Jojo Serrano when he says his works have no meaning. No matter what, don’t believe him.

Standing in front of one of his paintings, it’s easily understandable why. His works have a depth that is so in-your-face that one has to wonder why he doesn’t budge on his, “My work has no meaning.” stance.

Case in point: Johnson’s Pyramid. This homage to architect Philip Johnson mainly consists of interrelated triangles set in a garden. Intriguing from the very first sight, the geometrical shapes bring to mind goal post, playgrounds, and other famous pyramids such as the one found at the Louvre among other things. The artist, when asked about these shapes, the triangles in particular, gave his standard answer, “They don’t mean anything.” What is interesting though is that he himself wonders why these triangles keep resurfacing in his works, even prompting him to say, “Tell me more about my subconscious.”

The same goes for another of his pieces: Chandelier House. It’s one of those paintings that immediately offers a story: cast in dark gray, a house hangs from chains as ornamental chandeliers larger than the house itself loom over its roof. If a Paul Éluard poem were translated into a painting it would look like this one, Éluard known to be one of the founders of the Surrealist movement. Don’t tell Serrano that this composition is gloomy though – he will not agree, and instead will choose to focus on the sheer number of things to be seen in his painting. He’s right, because as dark as Chandelier House is, it is also extensively intricate, almost feminine, even pretty - perhaps as "beautiful as the chance meeting on a dissecting table of a sewing machine and an umbrella."

The grandest piece of the show, Cornucopia, is a Surrealist wet dream. All the objects that he constantly uses in his art are there: the mysterious brown parcel, which upon closer inspection turns out to be based on the Surrealist artist Man Ray’s photo entitled The Enigma of Isidore Ducasse, the wooden board with a hinge which is a blown up mouse trap, the stool with a rag hanging by its rungs, a sight usually seen at a house under construction. It is a mosaic. It is a mental tunnel, tumbled and shackled with subconscious arrays, a work that would make Breton’s automatism proud. It truly is a giant masterpiece.

Words by Lorena Ruiz Santos; Image: Jojo Serrano, Cornucopia, 2011 (detail)

“What kind of people would we have become if history were different?”

In Jet Pascua’s latest exhibition at Silverlens SLab 20SQUARE titled  The Victoria, the artist proposes that same query by “sinking” the Victoria––the first ship, out of five, to successfully circumnavigate the world with Ferdinand Magellan as its commandeer. Pascua replicates the top of the historical Spanish carrack’s mast based on a detailed replica of the ship found in a museum in Sevilla, keeping as close to the original, and making it look as if it were under water. In doing so, he invites the viewer as well, to contemplate what type of people Filipinos would be if the Spaniards never came.  

Evident in his works for the past couple of years, history, both personal and cultural, has played a significant role in the 42-year old’s artistic process, which aims to make sense of why we are what we are. The Victoria is no exception.

The second piece of Pascua’s exhibition presents a performance installation entitled Vanishing Horizon, a video instruction to prompt viewers to do the performance themselves. Inspired by Franz Fanon’s writings on colonization, specifically Fanon’s statement, “Violence is a man re-creating himself,” Vanishing Horizon may be strongly related to the idea of re-inventing oneself. “I see migration as the modern day colonization and this work is about the seemingly calm creation of a new experience and the violent erasure of the past,” Pascua shares.    

Known for his masterful and detailed graphite and acrylic on wood pieces, Pascua’s two-piece mixed media installation presents a coherent idea that both deal with disappearances and possibly even reinvention. It would not be wrong to assume that both works strongly tackle the idea of history whether it be factual or metaphorical.

Citing painting, drawing, installation, and video as preferred mediums, Pascua nixes notions he may have about his art, “I don’t think I have any style. I prefer not to be labeled and identified with any particular style. I want to enjoy the freedom of being able to do what I want to do, when I want.” In fact, he would rather leave it up to the viewer to formulate their own interpretation and ideas about his pieces.

Inspired by events, different publications, and artworks by other artists, and appreciative of the works Doris Salcedo, Bill Viola, Francis Alyss, and Robert Rauschenberg to name a few, the Norway based Filipino artist also keeps busy by running a non-profit art space. The Victoria is Pascua’s second show in the Silverlens Galleries.

Words by Monica Barretto; Image: Jet Pascua, The Victoria, 2011 (detail)