Courtyard
A Solo Exhibition by Mark Salvatus
Opening Reception October 17, 2009 Saturday 7pm

MANILA, Philippines – Officials from the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP) on Sunday conducted a security inspection at the Manila City Jail a day after a riot among prisoners caused the death of one inmate. – Sophia Dedace, GMANews.TV

In this project, Salvatus finds a news report about a deadly riot inside the Manila City Jail in 2008 and retells it in a different perspective in his new show – Courtyard in Pablo Gallery Fort in Taguig.

Working with communities and experiences, Salvatus reinvestigates the incident with various media. Making a re-enactment of some sort, he presents the story in a Crime Scene Investigation-type of exhibition. Different visual images are juxtaposed in the said courtyard—from drawings, to installations and objects.

Changing the relationship of the past to the present, the account of the riot now becomes a found object that Salvatus tries to visualize using “evidence” he collected inside the Manila City Jail. Using interviews, photographs, and his immersion experience inside the compound, he comes up with his own visual conclusion and combines them with his personal ideas—ideas that make a strong impression and emotional tension, establishing an intimate and charged dialogue with the audience—will they be familiarized by it or be alienated?

Mark Salvatus is a cross-disciplinary artist based in Lucban and Manila , Philippines . His works vary in different media from drawings, installations, objects, photography, video, street art, graphic design, and blogs, to interactive and participatory projects creating drama to question memory, nostalgia, existence, and space. He graduated Cum Laude from the University of Santo Tomas with a Fine Arts Major in Advertising Arts degree, and was about to finish his MFA from the same university when he discontinued his thesis. He has participated in various solo and group exhibitions/projects, among them at the Cultural Center of the Philippines, National Museum, Ateneo Art Gallery, Pablo Gallery, Green Papaya Art Projects (Manila), Goyang Art Studio Gallery and Dan Won Museum (Korea), No Space and SeeScape Art Hub (Thailand), Annexe Gallery and Valentine Willie Fine Art (Malaysia), Can Serrat Centro de Actividades Artisticas and Domestico 08 El Papel del Artista (Spain), ATVP Contemporary Art (Sydney), Saga Prefecture Museum (Japan), EXCEPT, Sala Silentium (Bologna), National Center of Contemporary Art (Moscow & Ekaterinburg), and at the 5th International Artist’s Book Triennial (Vilnius). He will be participating in an upcoming group show in Turin, Italy and in VWFA Singapore in November. Mark is currently teaching part-time at Kalayaan College in Marikina City and is also the co-founder of Pilipinas Street Plan, a community of street artists in Manila.