Photo Credit: Frances Wadsworth Jones
Ep.223 Pio Abad (b.1983) is an artist whose work is concerned with the personal and political entanglements of objects. His wide-ranging body of work, mines alternative or repressed historical events and offers counter narratives that draw out threads of complicity between incidents, ideologies and people. Deeply informed by unfolding events in the Philippines, where the artist was born and raised, his work emanates from a family narrative woven into the nation’s story.
He has exhibited at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford; 58th Carnegie International; the 5th Kochi-Muziris Biennial; Ateneo Art Gallery, Manila; Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo; Kadist, San Francisco; Oakville Galleries, Ontario; the 2nd Honolulu Biennial; 12th Gwangju Biennial; 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney and Gasworks, London. He was recently nominated for the 2024 Turner Prize.
Abad’s works are part of a number of important collections including Tate, UK; Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh; Hawaii State Art Museum, Honolulu and Singapore Art Museum.
Abad is also the curator of the estate of his aunt, the Filipino American artist Pacita Abad. He has co-curated monographic exhibitions on Pacita Abad at the Museum of Contemporary Art and Design Manila and Spike Island, Bristol.
Artist https://www.pioabad.com/
Ashmolean Museum https://www.ashmolean.org/exhibition/ashmolean-now-pio-abad-those-sitting-in-darkness | Shortlist Turner Prize https://www.ashmolean.org/press/ashmolean-now-pio-abad-turner-prize-shortlist-press-release
Pacita Abad https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacita_Abad | https://ago.ca/events/pacita-abad-roundtable-conversation | https://tinakimgallery.com/news/205-first-of-its-kind-retrospective-of-filipino-artist-pacita-abad-opens-cbs-news/
Frieze https://www.frieze.com/article/frieze-masters-magazine-2024-pio-abad-gerret-willemsz-heda
University of Oxford https://www.glam.ox.ac.uk/article/artist-pio-abads-exhibition-at-the-ashmolean-museum-shortlisted-for-2024-turner-prize
Royal Academy https://www.royalacademy.org.uk/art-artists/name/pio-abad
Kadist https://kadist.org/people/pio-abad/
Wallpaper https://www.wallpaper.com/art/turner-prize-2024-artists
Widewalls https://www.widewalls.ch/magazine/pio-abad-2024-turner-prize
Museums Association https://www.museumsassociation.org/museums-journal/news/2024/09/turner-prize-artist-explores-ashmolean-collection/
Vogue Philippines https://vogue.ph/lifestyle/art/pio-abad-exhibit-turner-prize/ | Pacita Abad https://vogue.ph/lifestyle/art/pacita-abad-decades-strong-path-of-color-set-ablaze/
Tatler Asia https://www.tatlerasia.com/lifestyle/arts/turner-prize-pio-abad-interview
Open Space Contemporary https://www.openspacecontemporary.com/projects/10-minutes-with-open-space/10-minutes-with-pio-abad/
Silver Lens https://www.silverlensgalleries.com/artists/pio-abad
Image courtesy of Pio Abad; photo: Andy Keate
Image courtesy of Pio Abad and Frances Wadsworth Jones; photo: Andy Keate
Image courtesy of Pio Abad; photo: Andy Keate
Image courtesy of Pacita Abad Arte estate; photo: Pioneer Studios Manila
Image courtesy San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; photo: Tenari Tuatagaloa
