Olan Ventura’s world is in motion

MANILA, Philippines - Things fall apart, the center cannot hold, there is a reign, nay, a riot of images.

In his latest exhibition titled “Unstilled Life” on view from Nov. 21 to Dec. 3 at the Ayala Museum ArtistSpace, Olan rethinks the way artists present the traditional still life painting by recasting image as “image-of-an-image” — things are in flux, in motion; printing errors alter the captured images; and colors and shadows run amuck in his frenzied vision.  Thus, “still life” becomes a contradiction in terms: unstable, cropped, unsteady and yet (in the hands of Olan) the artworks become a brilliant reflection of contemporary life.

In his “Cream of the Crop” paintings, Olan wants to show that what happens in the margins is equally valid. There is truth in the “marginalized.” In his “Before & Before” and “After & After” paintings, two images — positive and negative — are juxtaposed. The artist explains, “Both are equally truthful. I see an apple on the table and see right away the same apple with inverted colors. It’s a chicken-or-the-egg concept. Positive and negative images are juxtaposed to point out that both are of the same object: nothing came before and nothing came after.”

No single artist or idea influenced Olan Ventura’s latest suite of artworks. “Unstilled Life” is part of an evolution of a lifelong strategy on the part of the artist. He concludes, “Sometimes, you have to destroy beauty in order to create a new kind of beauty. To show another viewpoint of the beautiful.”

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The exhibit is organized by West Gallery. For inquiries, e-mail info@westgallery.org or call +632 4110336.