A State of Introspection
Marking his 20th year as a brilliant artist, Cebuano abstract expressionist Sio Montera had his most recent solo exhibit entitled “A State of Introspection” held at the Qube Gallery at Crossroads. Sio has spent more than a decade as a full-time associate professor for the Fine Arts Program of the University of the Philippines and is currently based in Taiwan to finish his Doctorate in Creative Industries Design at the National Cheng Kung University.
“Montera is at a turning point,” describes Adjani Arupmac of Sio Montera’s current artwork collection. “The titles of his works (How High You Go, The Struggle to Stay Low, I Am Because I Was, Youth Knows No Pain, Think of Yourself Less, et al.) are a peek into the turbulence of an ongoing reorientation brought by dislocation and alienation. A few bright color fields break the largely monochromatic series, distributing a level of warmth to an otherwise overall somber wintry tone that sets the mood of the exhibition. Where history in old spaces steeped in culture is found at the bottom of peeling layers of paint, one finds here through layers of being an art educator, advocate, gallery director—an informed artist at the core. This palimpsestuousness is a vantage point that has been consistently utilised to impart to students and colleagues that the struggle for cultural/artistic/creative identity is beyond seeking muse and market but instead in the mapping of meaning-making for the misgoverned, marginalised and emergent. In A State of Introspection, what is unseen is the Other as art professional inside a pall, patiently scratching and seeing through the strata to arrive at the surface.”
Sio Montera’s A State of Introspection runs until Saturday, Sept. 9 at Qube Gallery, which is open from Tuesdays to Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.