Poklong Anading (b. 1975, Manila, Philippines; lives and works in Manila) works with a wide range of mediums and is acclaimed for his pieces that investigate photography and travel. Fascinated with the process of creation and permutation, Anading explores different mediums to engage with a range of sociopolitical and environmental questions. Having begun his career as a painter, he is not driven by an overt agenda, but prefers to let his mind wander, thinking with and through his materials as they undergo their transformations. He frequently uses found objects and discarded materials that lead him to investigate notions of worth and value, and to explore what it means for art to exist inside and beyond capitalist production.

Anading has completed residencies with Big Sky Mind, Manila, Philippines (2003 to 2004), Common Room, Bandung, Indonesia (2008), Bangkok University Gallery, Thailand (2013), Selasar Sunaryo Art Space, Bandung, Indonesia (2013), Philippine Art Residency Program - Alliance Francaise de Manille in Cite Internationale des Arts, Paris, Centre Intermondes, La Rochelle in France (2014) and das weisse haus, Vienna Austria (2018). He had solo exhibitions in Galerie Zimmermann Kratochwill, Graz, Austria (2010 and 2012), Taro Nasu in Japan and Athr Gallery in Jeddah (2016), 1335MABINI in Manila, Philippines (2013, 2015 and 2017). He has been included in notable group exhibitions such as: Gwangju Biennial, South Korea (2002 and 2012), No Country: Contemporary Art for South and Southeast Asia, the first exhibition of the Guggenheim UBS Map Global Art Initiative in New York, Hong Kong and Singapore (2013 to 2014), 5th Asian Art Biennial: Artist Making Movement, National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, Taiwan (2015), The Shadow Never Lies, Minsheng Art Museum, Shanghai, Afterwork, Para Site, Hong Kong, China and in the Architecture Biennale for the 15th International Architecture Exhibition, Philippine Pavilion: Muhon: Traces of an Adolescent City at Palazzo Mora, Venice, Italy (2016), Constellations, Photographs in Dialogue, SFMOMA, California, USA (2021), Living Pictures: Photography in Southeast Asia at National Gallery Singapore (2022) and The Open World, Thailand Biennale (2023).

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Henrielle Baltazar Pagkaliwangan (b. 1994, Cavite, Philippines) explores stories behind mundane yet indispensable objects to examine Philippine history and material culture. Drawing inspiration from natural history illustration, she documents personal and historical narratives through prints and drawings.

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Pagkaliwangan graduated magna cum laude from the University of the Philippines Diliman, College of Fine Arts (Major in Studio Arts) in 2015, where she also received one of the Department of Studio Arts’ Outstanding Thesis Awards for her undergraduate thesis, Taxonomy of Things. In 2017, she won the grand prize in the Don Papa Rum Art Competition, which included a one-month residency in Florence, Italy. A recipient of the Cultural Center of the Philippines’ 13 Artists Awards in 2024, her work has been featured in solo and group exhibitions in the Philippines and abroad. She is currently pursuing a Master of Fine Arts degree at the University of the Philippines, where she also serves as a lecturer.

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Dealing with concepts of value, materiality, and banality, Jan Balquin works across different media ranging from paintings to collage. Exploring conventional notions of material and subject matter vis-a-vis unconventional imagery and simulacra, her recent paintings expand into sculptural forms that interrogate the qualities of the blank canvas as an object.

An alumna of the Philippine High School for the Arts, Balquin (b.1989) graduated with a degree in Fine Arts from the University of the Philippines, Diliman, having received a grant to pursue her thesis.

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Bea Camacho (b. 1983, Manila, Philippines) is a visual artist who works in installation, performance, and video. She received her B.A. in Visual and Environmental Studies from Harvard University, where she was awarded the Albert Alcalay Prize for Outstanding work in Studio Art and the David McCord Prize for Achievement in the Arts. 

She is a recipient of the Thirteen Artists Award from the Cultural Center of the Philippines. She was also selected as an exhibiting artist for the 2006 Asian Contemporary Art Week in New York City and for the 2009 International Women Artists Biennale in Incheon, Korea. Recently, her exhibition at MO_Space, Memento Obliviscere, was shortlisted for the Ateneo Art Awards 2018.

Her work has been exhibited in galleries internationally, including the Japan Society (New York), Osage Gallery (Hong Kong and Singapore), Ikkan Art Gallery (Singapore), Valentine Willie Fine Arts (Kuala Lumpur and Manila), Silverlens (Manila), Finale Gallery (Manila), MO_Space (Manila), and Green Papaya Art Projects (Manila). She has also shown her work in institutions including the Cultural Center of the Philippines, National Museum of the Philippines, Metropolitan Museum of Manila, Museum of Contemporary Art and Design in Manila, the Musee d'Art Moderne in St. Etienne, Kyoto Art Center, Hangaram Museum, EuGon Museum of Photography, Triennale di Milano Design Museum, Queens Museum of Art, Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston and the Tate Modern.

The pioneering Filipino conceptual artist, curator, and teacher Roberto Chabet is known for his groundbreaking experimental work which ranges from paintings, drawings, collages, sculptures, and installations that harness the found and the ordinary. 

As the founding Museum Director of the Cultural Center of the Philippines, Chabet (1937-2013) initiated the Thirteen Artists Award in 1970 which aimed to support young artists whose body of work expressed “recentness and a turning away from the past.” 

Posthumously awarded the Gawad CCP Para sa Sining in 2015, he had taught at the College of Fine Arts at the University of the Philippines Diliman for over thirty years. 

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Pardo de León’s paintings are reminiscent of the style of the old European Masters, and she is known for her distinctive style of painting marked by a ‘sense of line, gesture, and touch.’ Belonging to a generation of painters whose works are mainly based on found photographic imagery, de León approaches painting both intuitively and methodically. Working adeptly in both abstraction and figuration, she confronts conventions in painting through the juxtaposition of images, the layering of different forms and motifs, or by zooming in on particular aspects and details of the subject.

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Pardo de León graduated with a degree in Painting from the UP College of Fine Arts in 1987. She was a recipient of the CCP Thirteen Artists Award in 1988. She also received a studio residency grant from the Italian-Swedish Cultural Foundation in Venice, Italy in 1999, which was awarded the best show of the year by the state council. De León has had numerous solo and group exhibitions at various galleries and museums including the Cultural Center of the Philippines, Finale Art File, MO_Space, Blanc Gallery, Manila Contemporary, Valentine Willie Fine Art, and the Institute of Contemporary Art – La Salle College of the Arts in Singapore. She currently lives and works in Baguio City.

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Nilo Ilarde (b. 1960) is a conceptual artist and curator whose works navigate the intersections between image and word, drawing and writing, and surface and painting. Using both found and constructed objects, he assembles amalgams of image and text that  comment on both the formal and conceptual conditions of art and language. He strips and mines his subjects to reveal their history and materiality and in the process creates forms of both declaration and negation. 

Ilarde studied Painting at the University of the Philippines College of Fine Arts. Since the 80s, he has been exhibiting his works and curating exhibitions at various galleries and alternative spaces in Manila, including the Cultural Center of the Philippines, The Pinaglabanan Galleries, Finale Art File, West Gallery, Mag;net, MO_Space, Art Informal, and Underground. His works have also been featured in several international exhibitions and art fairs including solo presentations at Art Basel Hong Kong and Art Stage Singapore, both in 2015 and at Art Fair Philippines in 2018.  He is also the co-founder of King Kong Art Projects Unlimited and was one of the lead curators of ‘Chabet: 50 Years’ in various venues in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Manila from 2011–2012.

Geraldine Javier (b. 1970 in Makati City, Philippines; lives and works in Batangas, Philippines) is one of the Philippines’ most important and collected contemporary artists. With a Nursing degree from the University of the Philippines that included a top rank in the licensure exams, she took a second university degree in Fine Arts, and pursued an art practice. Since 1995, she has held more than 30 solo exhibitions in the Philippines, Malaysia, South Korea, Singapore, Germany, and China. From 1999 to 2003 she was a member of the Surrounded by Water collective.

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Much of her early work was in collage form but it was with paintings that she established her reputation as an inventive artist. These were characterized by either melancholy or wit: death and childhood were frequent subject matters. By 2008, she was making fabric works with the paintings and combining them in installations; exhibitions were a mixture of paintings, installations, and objects. Paintings would often have collaged elements, notably preserved beetles and butterflies.

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In 2013, she moved south from Manila to the countryside in the district of Batangas. Her work increasingly dealt with our relationship with nature. Current projects often involve the participation of the women in the community where she lives. She has exhibited at the Havana Biennial, in 2019, and the Helsinki Biennale in 2024

Celine Lee (b. 1993, Philippines) is a visual artist based in Metro Manila.

With an interest in understanding the underlying structures that govern our world, Lee’s practice integrates the natural sciences to explore the metaphysical aspects of our contemporary human experience. This exploration is characterized by her diverse use of materials and media in her body of work including painting, sculpture, embroidery, installation, and multimedia works – focusing on process and materiality. Lee’s practice reflects on the potential of visual and spatial experiences to suggest meanings that extend beyond their form.

Two of Celine Lee’s solo exhibitions held in the Philippines, “The Brightest Part” and “The Length and Breadth of Depth” have been shortlisted in the 2023 and 2021 Ateneo Art Awards Fernando Zóbel Prizes for Visual Art, respectively. She received an award of merit in the 2020 Philippine Art Awards and participated in S.E.A Focus 2023 in Singapore.

Celine Lee graduated from the University of Santo Tomas in 2015 with a BFA degree, majoring in Painting.

Audrey Lukban (b.1997) is a multidisciplinary artist based between Manila and London. She received her MA from Royal College of Art. Lukban works across painting, installation, and performance, investigating the relationship and boundaries between power and representation. Her practice often incorporates her personal belongings and archival images, often using shaped canvases, manipulating to recreate spaces of negotiation. Her works have been exhibited across Manila and London.

Christina Quisumbing Ramilo (b. 1961) examines and reimagines objects and their contexts through comprehension of material and site specificity. Her artistic practice involves an interest in and respect for the life and history of objects. With minimal intervention on their surfaces, she arranges them or reconfigures their parts, presenting other perspectives to their forms and functions. Often using unconventional materials (construction discards, architectural fragments, casts, recycled paper), and utilizing objects themselves as material (mirrors, bottles, old frames, clothing), most of which have been collected for years, she constructs the works in parts over long periods of time, never completely finished. Conferred with titles that employ wit and humor, they ultimately express her personal poetries.

Ramilo lives and works in the Philippines as a full-time artist and curator.

It is with timelessness that Elaine Roberto-Navas (b. 1964) works her brush and palette over canvas. With subjects ranging from flowers to furniture, from the sky to water, she paints with oil in thick strokes; the object appears swathed in movement. Still life or landscape as they may be considered, they move with each glance, and if you stare, the motion starts to permeate outside the four corners of her paintings. What Roberto-Navas captures in her work is not merely an object in nature, but its spirit in movement, and together with her technique, artistry, and will, her paintings exist in a timelessness that might outlive us all, yet carry our humanity onwards.

Elaine Roberto-Navas graduated with BA in Psychology from Ateneo de Manila University (1985), and a Fine Arts degree, Major in Painting from the University of the Philippines (1991). Roberto-Navas has received various awards including the Jurors’ Choice Awards from the Art Association of the Philippines (1994, 1995), the Honorable Mention from the Philip Morris Philippine Art Awards (1995), and the Honorable Mention from the Philip Morris Singapore Art Awards (2002). She has shown at the Ayala Museum, Silverlens Gallery, Finale Art File, MO_Space, Art Informal, West Gallery, UP Vargas Museum, the Cultural Center of the Philippines, and Valentine Willie Fine Art in Singapore to name a few.

Yasmin Sison (b. 1972) graduated from the University of the Philippines, with a Bachelor’s Degree in Humanities and then in the Fine Arts, Major in Painting. She was a member of the collective Surrounded by Water, and is the recipient of the Cultural Center of the Philippines Thirteen Artists Award (2006). She was also shortlisted for the Ateneo Art Awards (2007).  

Sison has shown in both solo and group exhibitions locally and abroad since 1996, in spaces such as West Gallery, Valentine Willie Fine Arts in Malaysia, Artesan Gallery in Singapore, Artinformal, Manila Contemporary, Silverlens Gallery, Blanc Gallery, and the Owen James Gallery in New York, to name a few. She has participated in international group exhibitions in Belgium (2000), Singapore (2002), and Italy (2009). 

Gerardo Tan, also known as Gerry Tan, is a visual artist, curator, and art educator. He finished Bachelor of Fine Arts, Major in Painting, at the University of the Philippines (UP) Diliman College of Fine Arts (CFA) in 1982 and Masters of Fine Arts, Major in Painting, at the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1992 as a Fulbright Fellow. He was a professorial lecturer at UP CFA from 1993 to 2000 and the former dean of the University of the East College of Fine Arts from 2002 to 2005. Tan was awarded the Cultural Center of the Philippines Thirteen Artists Award in 1988.

As a conceptual artist, Tan explores the nature of art and how forms and materiality can be articulated in ideas and concepts, be it through painting, sculpture, found objects, artists books, or installations. Often referencing and revisiting his earlier work, Tan deals with aesthetic questions related to the reproducibility of images and the spatial and temporal authenticity of a work.

Tan has exhibited at the Cultural Center of the Philippines, Jorge B. Vargas Museum, Ateneo Art Gallery, Metropolitan Museum of Manila, and Lopez Museum, among many more institutions in the Philippines. He has participated in several international exhibitions such as the 2nd Asian Art Show in Fukuoka Museum, 1982, the 1st Melbourne Biennale,1999, the 4th Gwangju Biennale, 2002, and the inaugural exhibition of The National Gallery of Singapore, 2016. He continues to work with contemporary artists making up the Bastards of Misrepresentation that is curated by Manuel Ocampo, which has aggressively and independently been exhibiting since 2010 in Berlin, Germany, Queens New York, and Sete, France.

In 2022, his work was featured at the Philippine Pavilion of the 59th Venice Biennale entitled Milk of Dreams, curated by Yael Buencamino and Arvin Flores.

MM Yu (b. 1978) lives and works in Manila, Philippines. Her photographs evoke the ever-changing cultural texture and topology of Manila as seen through its inhabitants, the city’s infrastructure and its waste product as it archives not only the economy but also the ecology of life in the myriad forms it takes in the city.

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These recorded static scenarios show through their thematic variety the artist’s interest in discovering and valuing the fleeting moment present even in its simplest components. The diverse elements in her works not only underscore the inability of photography to account for fractured temporality. Through her ongoing interest in deciphering the enigma of the unseen landscape of ordinary things, they also force us to rethink what our minds already know and rediscover what our eyes have already seen.

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The impact lies in how photography is employed to investigate another subject namely that of memory. By consolidating a series of routine snapshots traversing the streets of Manila. The hybrid and density of MM Yu’s subjects remind us of how objects and signs are not necessarily self-contained but take part in larger systems of interaction.

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MM Yu received her BFA Painting from the University of the Philippines and completed residencies with Big Sky Mind, Manila (2003), Common Room Bandung Residency Grant and Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, France (2013). She is a recipient of the Cultural Center of the Philippines 13 Artist Award (2009), the Goethe Institute Workshop Grant (2014), and the Ateneo Art Awards (winner in 2007, shortlisted in 2011). She was also a finalist for the Sovereign Asian Art Prize (2010).

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