SALVAGE PROJECT

New work for 2012: Yay!

2012-01-15T18:53:00.001+08:00

Yay!, 2012
Intervention at Art Stage Singapore
Glass, ice, cola
size variable

http://www.rebelart.net/diary/

Accidental Contemporary Art

2012-01-15T10:59:00.001+08:00

Accidental Contemporary Art (2008-ongoing)
21 Photographs (2011)
8 x 12 inches each

Accidental Contemporary Art is an ongoing photographic project that documents everyday objects and scenes that has resemblance to the practice of contemporary artists of today. From Damien Hirst's sculpture found in a medical shop in Manila, to Gerhard Richter's painting in a subway in Quezon City. A construction site in Amman that looks like the work of Christo and Jeanne-Claude to Yayoi Kusama's dress found in a market in Manila.

The project is like a game or play wherein the artist wants to blur the boundaries of art and life in everyday situation.

Accidental Subodh Gupta

Accidental Christo and Jeanne-Claude

Accidental Doris Salcedo

Accidental Martin Creed

Accidental Gerhard Richter

Accidental Mauricio Cattelan

Accidental Tracey Emin

Accidental Damien Hirst

Accidental Jeff Koons

Accidental Yayoi Kusama

View from Drawing Room booth at Art Stage Singapore 2012
http://drawingroomgallery.com/
http://www.artstagesingapore.com/
http://accidentalcontemporaryart.blogspot.com/

Secret Garden at Jakarta Biennale XIV

2012-01-15T09:24:00.001+08:00

"Secret Garden", 2009
Maximum City: Survive or Escape, Jakarta Biennale XIV 2011
Galeri Nasional, Jakarta, Indonesia
http://jakartabiennale.org/en/violence-and-resistance/mark-salvatus

http://jakartabiennale.org/en/maximum-city-home

The boat is sinking, group yourselves into...

2011-11-23T21:38:00.001+08:00

"The boat is sinking, group yourselves into", 2011
Black and white photograph
12 x 24 inches

Whisper

2011-11-20T10:51:00.001+08:00

Whisper, 2011
Intervention / Digital Photograph

Untitled

2011-11-14T11:18:00.001+08:00

Untitled, 2011
(5) 8"x12"
Digital C-print
Accumulated trash/objects inside my bag during my travels

part of the exhibition
http://nothing2declare2011.wordpress.com/

curated by Karen Flores
at Blanc Compound

Around 50 artistsaround the world that responded to the Call for Proposals in 2010 were selectedby the NTD Board of organizers and whose works will be shown successively atBlanc Compound starting from October 18 till November 12, 2011; UP Jorge VargasMuseum (November 18 2011 to January 7, 2012) and Yuchengco Museum (November 16,2011 to January 29, 2012).

These artists willcome to Manila to participate in a project with a participatory, collaborativeand makeshift framework, aiming to contribute to contemporary discourses onmigration. “Migration” broadly refers to movement of people not just acrosswaters, land, and air, but also across immediate, virtual and hyperrealities—and shifting societies. Focusing on those who have “nothing todeclare,” the project positions itself at the margins – a position that is asource of intervention and strength, of subterfuge and resistance, ofconstraint as well as change.

Kickingoff at a private gallery, NTD thrives in a blanc space, a white cubewhich could also be white space, characterized by an absence of color thatconnotes not just a seeming neutrality, but an open-endedness that couldeffectively ground a query into destinies and destinations. Migrationscan be cyclical and serial; thus, individual lives become similarly marked bycenters and stations. And as the NTD curatorial brief states, migrationcan also refer not only to movement of people across borders but to migrationsof form, realities and spaces.

NTDwas initiated and head curated by Flaudette May Datuin (Department of ArtStudies, College of Arts and Letters, University of the Philippines head),associate curators Leo Abaya (Vargas Museum, UP College of Fine Arts faculty),Claro Ramirez (Yuchengco Museum),and Karen Ocampo Flores (visual artist andcultural worker). NTD was organized by Datuin, Josephine Turalba (Dean, Schoolof Fine Arts and Design, Philippine Women’s University) and Precious Leano(Executive Director, Filipino Visual Arts and Design Rights Organization orFILVADRO).

Documentation of the exhibition:
http://nothing2declare2011.wordpress.com/blanc/

Other View

2011-10-10T09:11:00.004+08:00

Other View
Solo Exhibition by Mark Salvatus
The Drawing Room Contemporary Art
October 15, 2011 - November 8, 2011
http://drawingroomgallery.com/

Other View is about the possibilities of art in the prosaic, as it is about the impossibility of capture: of objects and of art. Mark Salvatus brings together here work reminiscent of many others he's done before, but which are necessarily new by virtue of his interest in the transient and silent and fleeting, taking an object and all that it means and putting it into question as it highlights its utility, or makes it bigger pitted against another, or demands it make a statement in its mere existence, always in the process pointing a finger at the contemporary process of artmaking. But Other View is also ultimately about Salvatus' insistence on the spectator's experience of these objects as art as objects that are familiar and everyday, where intertextuality is default in the process of making sense of what is the ordinary turned object of art, where the gaze is the tenuous space within which the spectator finds meaning and enters a particular process of creativity. That this could mean objects being retured to their proper places, of artlessness and meaninglessness, is not so much a risk that Salvatus takes, as it is exactly the point.

Text by Katrina Stuart Santiago

Jungle

2011-10-09T19:42:00.003+08:00

Jungle, 2011
Acrylic, steel, light
size variable
Territory Movement (ASEAN and China - 10+1 Art Strategic Exhibition)

4th Guangzhou Triennale
Art Domain Migration section
Meta-Question - Back to the Museum Itself
September 22, 2011 to November 27, 2011
Guangdong Museum of Art

Curators: Lou Yiping, Yang Xiaoyan, Zhang Kexin, Zhang Yun

http://www.gdmoa.org/zhanlan/threeyear/Thefourth/21/20425.jsp

Wrapped: Koganecho, Yokohama

2011-10-09T19:35:00.003+08:00

Wrapped: Koganecho, 2011
Voices of Town
Koganecho Bazaar
Parallel event of Yokohama Triennale 2011
http://www.koganecho.net/koganecho-bazaar-2011/

Curators: Mayumi Hirano & Simon Soon

Wrapped: Pittsfield, Massachusetts

2011-10-09T19:21:00.000+08:00

Wrapped:Pittsfield
Massachusetts
Art Omi- Storefront Artist Projects
http://wrappedtraces.blogspot.com/

Thank you to Ferrin Gallery

Genius Knows No Country

2011-07-17T11:25:00.003+08:00

Genius Knows No Country, 2011
Mixed media installation
Size variable
Art OMI Open Studio
Ghent, New York

http://www.artomi.org/

Supported by Ateneo Art Gallery
Ateneo de Manila University
Philippines

NY Projects Art OMI / Ateneo Art Award

c_rafts

2011-06-18T12:57:00.006+08:00

c_rafts
West Wing, Vargas Museum
curated by Patrick D. Flores
17th June - 17th August 2011

The vessel is facture: hewn with care and made to survive, outlast uncertain weather. Discard, surplus, remnant, scrap, pilfered piece, found object are re-used, re-functioned – made to float amid the city’s debris. Mark Salvatus used to live and study and teach in an old quarter in Manila known for flooding and the people who withstand the onslaught season after season. His art is keen on this cycle of calamity and prevailing, dwelling on the skill to craft, the instinct to gather, in other words, the strategy to assemble with the technique and memory of bricolage, to paddle around islands of disaster, this archipelago of flotsam. This is the very process of community as well as the logic of a sinking economy. The makeshift c_rafts are buoyant, barely

-Patrick D. Flores

http://vargasmuseum.wordpress.com/

Kitschy-ness aside: Notes on Mark Salvatus’ c_raft

by Dayang Yraola

On the one hand, books have been written about the Philippine jeepney aka “Hari ng Kalsada.” It is the foremost transportation of Filipinos since after the war—an army jeep converted into a 16 seater-passenger vehicle, fully decorated, sound and lights blasted. In so many occasions, jeepney has been called a symbol of Filipino culture. Our being sociable reflected in the way commuters are supposedly seated beside each other, almost ready to chat. Our love for fancy décor and religious emblems painted or pasted on the dashboard, wall, ceiling, and hood or wherever you find space. An Austrian friend, who could not get enough of the jeepney nicknamed it disco-jeep, because each ride, he said, referring to both how the jeepney looks like and how it is driven, feels like a night in a discothèque.

On the other hand, when the flood in the Metro rises, jeepney hits their break, and flood-rafts became a more suitable mode of transport. Discarded inflatable beds or Styrofoam, fitted with plastic stools, chairs or crates, topped with a wide picnic umbrella. This is how flood rafts looks like almost everywhere in the country. They are usefully, innovative and fancy. But so far, none if not little has been written about these flood-rafts. Like a jealous child, I say, how come there is none, when obviously they too are kitschy enough to reveal our preference over “cool” stuff?

These same things Mark Salvatus call c_raft; toying with the word craft and raft. Salvatus’ c_raft are improvised rafts with the same inflatable beds with plastic chairs, biscuit boxes and picnic umbrellas like a real flood-raft, “traversing” the L-shaped West Wing Gallery of UP Vargas Museum from 17 July to 17 August.

According to Salvatus’ exhibit statement, that “through these objects, multi-layer of relations and functions are crafted and constructed, further exploring the idea of consumerism, security, urbanism and everyday politics.”I thought Salvatus’ exhibit is an affirmation of the place of these flood-rafts in the minds of the commuting public and a bold academic holler for students of Folk art to include the flood-rafts in their long list of interest.

Kitschy-ness aside, Salvatus’ c_raft, makes people realize that indeed Metro Manila streets have two kings, two Hari ng Kalsada—the jeepney when it is dry and the flood-rafts as soon as the rain falls. The show lends the flood-rafts its long overdue acknowledgment of being the other Hari ng Kalsada.

Like the jeepney, flood-raft reveals the innovative spirit of the Filipinos--our ability to find ways either for convenience or ultimate survival. It exhibits the entrepreneurial spirit—the way we see opportunities to earn despite and beyond temporary and desperate market. It concretizes our claim of creativity to make objects of awe and wonder, because we could just easily have built boats (since boat-making is part of our culture), but instead some madlang-tao-genius thought of assembling this thing. While we wait for the government to find solution for the floods, the flood-raft makers ensure that a flood can be ridden and that their flood-rafts are funky enough to capture a commuter’s interest, attention and some pesos for each ride.

While Salvatus’ c_raft makes its way as one of the most intelligent exhibit an artist (and his curator) must be proud of.

____________________________

thank you to:

Susie Garcia, John Tan, Portia Placino, Vermonyo, Con Cabrera, Kelvin Co, Rica Estrada & Eloi Hernandez

Vernacular Cultures and Contemporary Art

2011-05-19T08:07:00.005+08:00

Photos by Michelle MacFarlane

La Trobe University Museum of Art (LUMA) will showcase selected works by leading artists from Australia, India and the Philippines in the exhibition ‘Vernacular Cultures and Contemporary Art’ from 5 May to 17 June.

‘Vernacular Cultures and Contemporary Art from Australia, India and the Philippines’ features contemporary artists whose work incorporates expressions of indigenous and/or locally specific popular cultures. Examining diverse practices that engage themes including surf culture, karaoke, religious iconography, street advertising and popular architecture, the exhibition asks how contemporary artists deploy vernacular cultures to explore the social and cultural conditions of globalisation.

Artists featured in the exhibition include: Raqs Media Collective, Thukral and Tagra, Fiona Foley, Scott Redford, Sangeeta Sandrasegar, Maria Cruz, Mark Salvatus, TV Moore, Hoang Tran Nguyen, and Ken Botnick and Diana Guerrero-Maciá.

Curated by Ryan Johnston

My Farmville, Hacienda, 2010
http://marksalvatus.blogspot.com/2010_04_01_archive.html

La Trobe University, Melbourne

Secret Garden La Trobe University Visual Arts Centre

2011-04-28T16:19:00.008+08:00

SECRET GARDEN

April 20-May 15, 2011
ACCESS Gallery
La Trobe University Visual Arts Centre
Bendigo, Victoria
Australia

In small, crowded Cell 15 of the Quezon Provincial Jail, using seeds shaken out from their leftover meals, and digging with plastic utensils to soften the earthen floor, inmates have managed to coax plants to life. A vegetable garden has flourished despite restrictions from prison authorities, despite the absence of suitable tools.

Mark Salvatus, who counts holding art classes for prisoners at the Manila City Gaol among his advocacies, got wind of this story. When commissioned to do a piece for Sungdu-an 5 at the National Museum in October 2009, Mark took inspiration from this prison tale.

From a story of patience and creativity, Mark Salvatus embarked on his own process of patience and creativity. Ultimately, he leaves us with an interactive installation that delivers an experience as memorable as the narrative from whence it came. -Trickie Lopa

Mark’s Secret Garden is viewed in a small cupboard in the gallery wall at the VAC. Here you will see flowers, miniature palm and grass crafted by prisoners from discarded plastic bottles. Magnified on a wall next to the garden, Mark reproduces a tattoo of a snarling tiger, the symbol a prison gang used to mark the area as its territory.

As part of the exhibition at the Visual Arts Centre, Mark is exhibiting a new work entitled “Intimation” (2011) which is about a found object that he stumbled upon while having an quick guided tour inside the decommissioned Bendigo prison. He found the knife cupboard, made out of steel and secured with a padlock, in the prison’s kitchen. This object can talk about different stories that we can construct because of its strong image and its history. Victoria’s oldest prison, the Bendigo Gaol was shut down in 2006 after 145 years. Bendigo Senior Secondary College will use part of the historic building as classrooms in the future.

Mark acknowledges the following individuals and institutions for their generous assistance in realizing this exhibition:

Bill and Debra Higgs, Bendigo Senior Secondary College
Paul Northam, Managing Curator, La Trobe University Visual Arts Centre
Ramon E. S. Lerma, Director and Chief Curatror, Ateneo Art Gallery, Ateneo de Manila University
Yael Buencamino, Managing Curator, Ateneo Art Gallery, Ateneo de Manila University
Ian Carlo Jaucian, Exhibitions Coordinator, Ateneo Art Gallery, Ateneo de Manila University
Patrick D. Flores, Curator, Vargas Museum, University of the Philippines
Trickie Lopa, Art writer and blogger

La Trobe University VAC

supported by

Ateneo Art Gallery

HM Prison Bendigo was a medium security prison facility located in Bendigo, Victoria, Victoria, Australia. The prison provided accommodation for prisoners assessed as suitable for treatment in the area of substance abuse and addictive/compulsive behaviours. The prison was opened in 1863 after building began in the 1850s. A major refurbishment which included sewering each cell was undertaken in 1993-94. Accommodation was mostly in single cells, with a small number of shared cells.
The prison was officially closed on 5 January 2006 by Corrections Minister Tim Holding.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HM_Prison_Bendigo

La Trobe University Visual Arts Center

2011-04-12T20:12:00.006+08:00

Currently in La Trobe University Visual Arts Center
Bendigo, Victoria, Australia
granted by Ateneo Art Gallery

http://www.latrobe.edu.au/vac

Wrapped: Singapore Biennale

2011-04-11T20:26:00.006+08:00

Wrapped, 2011
Singapore Art Museum 8Q
Open House
3rd Singapore Biennale
March 12 - May 15, 2011
http://www.singaporebiennale.org/

Curators: Russel Storer and Trevor Smith
Artistic director: Matthew Ngui

Links:
Designboom
Today Online
CNN Go
August Man.com
Philstar
The Nation

blogs:

Lzai
I-S
ArtSpy
For Art's Sake
Krea Comunicacion
Tokigool

Special Thanks to my former students in UST Fine Arts who helped me on this project:
Derek Tumala
Mok Vivas
Myke Motus
+
Terence Lin and his wife.

OPEN HOUSE Singapore Biennale 2011

2011-03-01T09:19:00.006+08:00

Will be doing my Wrapped project for the 3rd Singapore Biennale
curated by Russell Storer, Trevor Smith and Matthew Ngui

http://www.singaporebiennale.org/

http://wrappedtraces.blogspot.com/

March 13-May 15, 2011

The street has been the inspiration and location for much of Mark Salvatus’ work. Under the tag Boy Agimat, Salvatus co-founded the Pilipinas Street Plan collective, which included graffiti artists, musicians, muralists and skateboarders. His participation in the artist group TutoK also involves interventions and advocacy in the public sphere. His Wrapped projects, which have been undertaken in cities all over the world since 2007, including Barcelona, Manila, Bandung, Bangkok, Amman and Kuala Lumpur, invite passers-by to draw the outline of a personal object they are carrying onto a found wall, which the artist then fills in with bandage patterns. The abstract yet suggestive shapes become an archive of private traces "to be opened with the hands in our heads".

Text from http://www.singaporebiennale.org/about.php

Boat & Bridge_Net Book

2011-01-03T16:31:00.002+08:00

Boat & Bridge_Net
published by Space Beam, Incehon South Korea
December 2010

Artists/contributors

Emilija Skarnulyte(Lithuania)
Lenny Correa(U.S, Equador)
Mark Salvatus (Philippines)
Gerard Cuatero(Spain)
Radmila Oncevska(Macedonia)
Minah Son(South Korea)
Doharm Oh+Hoeun Lee(South Korea)
Yoojeong Choi(South Korea)

Book design: Sinae Kim & Hyojin Ham
Translated by Eunju Yoo

Common Room

2010-12-03T14:53:00.005+08:00

Artist Residency in Common Room Networks Foundation
Bandung, Indonesia
http://commonroom.info/

Program Residensi Seni
Mark Salvatus (Filipina)
30 November 2010 – 16 Desember 2010 | Mark akan berkegiatan di Common Room dan berkolaborasi dengan seniman dan komunitas lokal.

Supported by Ateneo Art Gallery
http://www.ateneoartgallery.org/

Lost Angels

2010-11-18T12:41:00.009+08:00

Lost Angels, 2010
postcards, wall drawing, maps, digital photographs
size variable

Gunsan Art Studio
Gunsan, South Korea

http://www.neolook.com/archives/20101012k

Wrapped:Gunsan

2010-10-28T09:33:00.005+08:00

http://wrappedtraces.blogspot.com
Supported by Gunsan ART Residency
Gunsan, South Korea
Director Shin Sik-Hoo

http://wrappedtraces.blogspot.com

G20 Food Summit

2010-10-17T19:42:00.012+08:00

G20 Food Summit, 2010

Cookbook printed on hanji (Korean paper)

unlimited copies

Space Beam, Incheon, South Korea

I collected 20 different recipes from 20 different Asian migrant workers in Incheon and made a DIY cookbook. Different recipes like adobo from the Philippines and vegetable curry from Bangladesh... I also gathered their stories from a report of Amnesty International about the current situations of migrant workers in Korea, their struggles and difficulties. I then sent a copy of the cookbook to the Seoul Summit committee and eventually they can serve the food in a banquet for the ministers and bank governors of the G20 members.

What is the G-20

The Group of Twenty (G-20) Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors was established in 1999 to bring together systemically important industrialized and developing economies to discuss key issues in the global economy. The inaugural meeting of the G-20 took place in Berlin, on December 15-16, 1999, hosted by German and Canadian finance ministers.

Mandate

The G-20 is the premier forum for our international economic development that promotes open and constructive discussion between industrial and emerging-market countries on key issues related to global economic stability. By contributing to the strengthening of the international financial architecture and providing opportunities for dialogue on national policies, international co-operation, and international financial institutions, the G-20 helps to support growth and development across the globe.

The G-20 is made up of the finance ministers and central bank governors of 19 countries:

Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Republic of Korea, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States of America

Migrant workers decry crackdown

07-20-2010 18:59

By Kwon Mee-yoo
Staff reporter

Black balloons bearing messages against the G20 summit scheduled in November were popped in protest by migrant workers, street vendors and homeless people, showing their objection to the government’s recent clampdown before the big international event.

Civic groups against the government’s oppression of human rights of social minorities held a press conference Tuesday in front of Myeongdong Cathedral.

The government said it would clamp down on unregistered foreigners until August as part of its efforts to boost security ahead of the G20 summit. However, migrant workers organizations refuted the idea as it condemned all unregistered international residents as possible terrorists.

Michel from the Philippines, the chief of the Migrants’ Trade Union, said the government should protect minorities such as migrant workers, street vendors and the homeless.

“The Korean government is using the G20 summit as an excuse to attack minorities,” he said. “We want the government to end their oppression. Stop the crackdown!”

continue reading here: http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2010/07/117_69827.html

http://cafe.naver.com/sarangbangguests

G20 ad in the subway

Collecting recipes in a free Korean language class in Tap Dong Catholic Church in Incheon

Special thanks to:
Kang Byungjin
Hyojin Ham

2010 Gunsan ART Residency

2010-09-30T23:42:00.003+08:00

I am currently in the port city of Gunsan, South Korea
http://cafe.naver.com/gunsanartresidency.cafe

An international network artists’ residency program for local, Korean, and overseas artists. It aims to exchange and share Asia’s specific social, cultural situations as well as art experiences. This program is supported by the Artist Residency Fund, Arts and Culture Sector, Jeollabuk-do, korea

This artist residency program focuses on sharing memories and experiences of Asian countries where memories of imperialistic colonization and the memories of being colonized cross. Through this, we may arrive at an realistic insight on the post-colonial modernity that we need to address however painful.

Also, in association with the on-going regional task on hand, in order to revitalize industrial heritage (modern cultural heritage) that is scattered around this region, we seek to organize art and creative activity utilizing these facilities for further revitalization of unused spaces, for international network, and to give specific and creative outlook for citizen’s art and culture activities.

From this perspective, the industrial heritage (modern cultural heritage) that we are interested in is ‘Nagasaki 18 Bank’ that is located in Jangmi-dong of Gunsan. Creative and exemplary model of revitalization of an old historical site can be found in ‘BankART 1929’ in Yokohama, Japan. As a part of the “Creative City Yokohama” project that the city of Yokohama launched in 2004, ‘BankART1929’ was created by revitalizing the stone building that was built in 1929 and used as ‘Fuji Bank’ and ‘Dai Ichi Bank’, which is transformed into an art space. Yokohama was Japan’s first open port city and the origin of the modernisation in Japan. Taking a cue from this historical fact, ‘BankART 1929’ focuses not only on the physical revitalization of the building but creating an art-based project named ‘BankART 1929, and we take a special attention to this.

Selected Korean and other Asian local artists utilize the former ‘Nagasaki 18 Bank’ as their studio, and they will participate in local tour, research, workshop, seminar, and education programs exchanging their own experiences of their home cities as well as that of Gunsan. In the end, they will extend their communication to the citizens by exhibiting the products of their artistic works.

In summary, the Gunsan Residency Program utilizes industrial heritage sites and unused spaces that are historically meaningful in the region. Also, by conducting art and culture programs and projects within the context of international exchange, it seeks to make an opportunity to look at the region from a fresh eye, and to find a creative model for regional art and culture activities. / Shin, Suk-ho