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Pacita Abad: Underwater Wilderness: Tina Kim Gallery, New York

Past exhibition
27 June - 16 August 2024
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  • Installation Views
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Overview
Pacita Abad: Underwater Wilderness, Tina Kim Gallery, New York

Pacita Abad: Underwater Wilderness

June 27 - August 16, 2024

 

Tina Kim Gallery is pleased to present "Underwater Wilderness," the gallery's second solo show dedicated to the late Filipina-American artist Pacita Abad. Featuring eight monumental trapuntos, a form of textile-painting that Pacita pioneered, this exhibition offers a focused selection of significant work created between 1985 and 1989 from a small series inspired by the artist's fantastical experiences scuba diving in the Philippines. The whimsical paintings originally debuted as an immersive installation in 1986 at the Ayala Museum in Manila, and will be reunited in New York for the first time since their 1987 display at the Philippine Center. On view at the gallery from June 27th to August 16th, this stirring presentation runs concurrently with Pacita's major retrospective at MoMA PS1, which closes on September 2nd before traveling to the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto.

 

The "Underwater Wilderness" series developed after Pacita learned to dive at the British Sub-Aquatic Club in Thailand in the 1980s. Prior to this, she had a fear of water after a traumatic childhood experience in which she nearly drowned. Conquering her aquaphobia, Pacita became a proficient scuba diver and made over 80 dives across the Philippines, from Sepoc Beach to Dumaguete, Puerto Galera, Apo Island, and the Hundred Islands. The wondrous sub-aquatic ecosystems that Pacita encountered during her dives provided ample inspiration for the inveterate colorist.

 

These dense, kaleidoscopic, and sensorial paintings—marked by Pacita's signature vibrancy and visible stitching—transport viewers to a mesmerizing undersea locale. To portray the inspiring and lush marine environments that left her in awe, Pacita sewed pieces of fabric together to form complex and layered compositions before painting and embellishing the canvas. In Dumaguete's Underwater Garden (1987), she clearly delineates parts of the reef through a laborious combination of stitching and stuffing while rendering other parts in impressionistic strokes to create the illusion of motion. In Shallow Gardens of Apo Reef (1986), fluorescent corals, sinuous vegetation, and diverse aquatic life emerge through a highly inventive use of found materials culminating in a maximalist, vertical composition.

 

An abiding interest in alternative, non-hegemonic systems of meaning connects Pacita's diverse subject matter, from the politically charged "Immigrant Experience" works exploring the possibility of "third-world" solidarities to the idiosyncratic "Masks and Spirits" series tackling complex questions about the mutability of representation and tradition in modernity. Though described by critics as her least political body of work, "Underwater Wilderness" harkens back to the artist's Ivatan roots and connection to Batanes, Philippines, where she was born and raised. The series can perhaps be read as Pacita's bridging of personal and political histories and the "manifold lived realities" of the Philippines. After she led student demonstrations against dictator Ferdinand Marcos in the late '60s, her parents encouraged her to complete her studies abroad after her family home was sprayed with bullets. She was only able to return to live in the Philippines in 1982 after twelve years away, and started this body of work the year before the fall of the kleptocratic regime in 1986.

 

For an artist whose multimodal life resists essentialization, "Underwater Wilderness" further complicates the discourse around her practice. When describing her diving experience, Pacita said that she felt like "an infidel intruding into somewhere sacred." In a body of water where different currents both literal and metaphorical collide, Pacita found a space of liberation, recovery, and possibility.

 

Watch Pacita Abad: Underwater Wilderness 

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Installation Views
  • Courtesy of Tina Kim Gallery. Photo by Hyunjung Rhee.
    Courtesy of Tina Kim Gallery. Photo by Hyunjung Rhee.
  • Underwater Tkg 2024 Install 3
  • Underwater Tkg 2024 Install 1
  • Underwater Tkg 2024 Install 6
  • Underwater Tkg 2024 Install 5
  • Underwater Tkg 2024 Install 2
Works
  • Anilao at its best, 1986 Oil, acrylic, mirrors, plastic buttons and rhinestones on stitched and padded canvas 116 x 125 in 295 x 318 cm
    Anilao at its best, 1986
    Oil, acrylic, mirrors, plastic buttons and rhinestones on stitched and padded canvas
    116 x 125 in
    295 x 318 cm
  • Dumaguete's underwater garden, 1987 Oil, acrylic, glitter, gold thread, buttons, lace, sequins on stitched and padded can 85 x 118 in 216 x 300 cm
    Dumaguete's underwater garden, 1987
    Oil, acrylic, glitter, gold thread, buttons, lace, sequins on stitched and padded can
    85 x 118 in
    216 x 300 cm
  • Hundred Islands, 1989 Oil, acrylic, glitter, gold thread, buttons, lace, sequins on stitched and padded canvas 72 x 94 in 183 x 239 cm
    Hundred Islands, 1989
    Oil, acrylic, glitter, gold thread, buttons, lace, sequins on stitched and padded canvas
    72 x 94 in
    183 x 239 cm
  • Portuguese man o' war, 1986 Acrylic, gauze, yarn on canvas 71 x 23 in
    Portuguese man o' war, 1986
    Acrylic, gauze, yarn on canvas
    71 x 23 in
  • Puerto Galera IV, 1986 Acrylic, mirrors, buttons, sequins on stitched and padded canvas 79 x 102 in 200 x 259 cm
    Puerto Galera IV, 1986
    Acrylic, mirrors, buttons, sequins on stitched and padded canvas
    79 x 102 in
    200 x 259 cm
  • Sepoc wall, 1985 Oil, acrylic, mirrors and buttons on stitched and padded canvas 116 x 112 in 295 x 285 cm
    Sepoc wall, 1985
    Oil, acrylic, mirrors and buttons on stitched and padded canvas
    116 x 112 in
    295 x 285 cm
  • Shallow gardens of Apo Reef, 1986 Oil, acrylic, mirrors, plastic buttons, cotton yarn, rhinestones on stitched and padded canvas 132 x 137 in 335 x 348 cm
    Shallow gardens of Apo Reef, 1986
    Oil, acrylic, mirrors, plastic buttons, cotton yarn, rhinestones on stitched and padded canvas
    132 x 137 in
    335 x 348 cm
  • The far side of Apo Island, 1989 Oil, acrylic, gold thread, plastic buttons, lace, sequins on stitched and padded canvas 88 x 69 in 224 x 175 cm
    The far side of Apo Island, 1989
    Oil, acrylic, gold thread, plastic buttons, lace, sequins on stitched and padded canvas
    88 x 69 in
    224 x 175 cm
Press
  • Pacita Abad, Larger Than Life

    Chantal McStay, ArtReview, August 13, 2024
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  • Through Mixed-Media Quilts, Pacita Abad Dives Into the Lush Marine Ecosystems of the Philippines

    Grace Ebert, Colossal, August 9, 2024
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  • What I’m Looking At: Museum-Quality Malcolm Morley, Borna Sammak’s Beautiful Scenesters, and More

    Ben Davis, Artnet, July 25, 2024
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  • Pacita Abad’s Plunge into the Deep

    Rory Mitchell, Ocula, June 27, 2024
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