Upcoming Exhibition
KoreanABOUT THE ARTIST
Oca Villamiel
(b. 1953- Philippines)
His notable pieces include Payatas (2013), exhibited at the Singapore Biennale, which uses doll parts to comment on societal struggles. Villamiel’s works have been shown in major galleries like Ateneo Art Gallery and Singapore Art Museum.
Villamiel's installations are characterized by the meticulous collection and assembly of discarded objects, transforming them into evocative artworks. His practice is rooted in the act of salvaging and mending, aiming to give new life to materials deemed worthless. Through this process, he addresses issues such as poverty, displacement, and the resilience of communities.
Bahay ng Mangingisda,2025
Discarded nylon fish nets 152 x 213 x 152 cm
Oca Villamiel confronts the precarious conditions of life in his hometown of Barangay Caridad, Atimonan, a fishing community marked by poverty and hardship. Bahay ng Mangingisda recreates the scale of a fisherman’s hut from an immense mound of nylon fishnets. Implements for entrapment take the form of protective shelter, conjuring the tension between fragile refuge and the burden of scarcity.
Traces, 2022
Fish Bone, 685.8 x 137.16 cm
Oca Villamiel’s Traces is a haunting collection of 180 framed pieces made entirely of fish bones. On first encounter, the works appear delicate, almost ornamental, but their quiet arrangement carries the weight of lives marked by struggle. Each bone is a fragment of survival, a trace of scarcity. The series speaks to the persistence of poverty: even when the fish is gone, its skeleton remains, reminding us of hunger that has not disappeared.