16 September - 15 October 2023. Unusual Suns.
Mo Space, Metro Manila, Philippines.

In Unusual Suns, Miguel Aquilizan and Costantino Zicarelli freely assume the roles of conjurers, but instead of spirit what appears before the viewer are the artists’ dreams of form and material. The objects, in shapes of their own invention, may very well be apparitions of a certain kind, ambiguous and implicit until recognisable figures pull one out of the wonder. The figures, although disfigured—a plaster bust or fiberglass arm—tether the exhibition to a world-to-be, one that might be built through the unlikely pairing of the tactical and the mystical. Such is at the intersection of the artists’ practices, a manifestation of shared tendencies: the processual collection of salvaged parts for later use, and a strong fascination for ritual. The viewer is invited to coexist.

Rising and setting in this world-to-be is not one but two suns, making time move differently here. Sculpture, within it a peak objecthood that best embodies the artists’ histories with form and material, is at the core. Departing from assemblage, Aquilizan returns to his training in sculpture with classical techniques applied to various components. Some traditional, some found, he manipulates plaster, cement, and wood with precision and playfulness, resulting in towering gestures of geometric pattern and organic silhouette. Something about these sculptures are more like structures, perhaps in the way the wooden foundations can be taken as projections from the artist’s affinity with design. Zicarelli, despite his longer history with paper and canvas, is present in a similar manner: by way of structure. Wooden cutouts of the Sierra Madre that often feature in his paintings as frames are transfigured into abstract scaffolds, at times readymade, signaling a recurring impulse to carry rather than carve. Lifted from the ground and given new form are fragments of old paintings and found practice statues, their attachments seemingly tentative, inviting the possibility to witness them in the process of becoming. 

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Collaborative object-works, as well as drawings and a painting by Zicarelli, are interspersed throughout the exhibition, joining the viewer in witnessing the ritual. An attuned mind’s eye will notice a kind of synchronized soaring in the sculptural display: Aquilizan’s tall sentinels and Zicarelli’s mountainous landscape are both oriented skyward. Of the history of civilization, it has been said that ancient structures point to the sky to bring their makers closer to enlightenment. A consonance can be made along the lines of aspiration, but towards different spiritual aims. In the case of the artists, a clearer understanding of their respective callings, one that only reveals itself through the ritual of practicing with others. In undermining the physical confines of the exhibition space, and deferring to the skies—or the suns contained within it, an upspring in temperament may be had if the viewer is so inclined.

Exhibition Text Author: N.B.