June to October 2023
In its second year, my project “laro na tayo – let's play” continues its social engagement !! For 2023, in addition to more venues in Vancouver, I'm also reaching out to communities outside Vancouver ... starting with Bowen Island, Prince George, Victoria and Nanaimo. I think it's important to share our histories - in my case the Philippine-Canadian experience - and celebrate the culture we each represent. Watch this space !!
Thank You - Salamat po !!
Did you know that I started a Youtube channel?
The channel titled "Paul de Guzman presents ... Art" is dedicated to showcasing historical, contemporary, outsider and other artists who I feel are under-represented. It's part of my ongoing virtual museum project called MAA - Museum for the Administration of Aesthetics. Most of the videos will be based in Vancouver but will also post videos from elsewhere as I travel.
I need your help to expand my subscriber base. It's free to subscribe and helps the channel gain momentum. Please consider going to the channel and hitting the "Subscribe" button. Videos are posted weekly and you will be notified when a new video is posted. I'm excited to share this new project with you and I really appreciate your support so click the image below, explore and Subscribe !!!
October 29 until November 20, 2022
Nicho ... isang guwang sa pader o isang pader ng mga guwang, na nagsisilbing naglalaman ng isang rebulto, isang imahe o isang palamuti.
Nicho ... hueco practicado en una pared o muro, en especial el que sirve para contener una estatua, una imagen o un adorno.
Nicho ... a hollow in a wall or a wall of hollows, especially the one that serves to contain a statue, an image or an ornament.
“Nicho” is an installation populated by a selection of box constructions and sculptures made in the past couple of months. The works are imbued with cultural objects and personal rituals forgotten from decades of material accumulation and neglect. These constructions demonstrate an economy of means with a cleverness in craft. As foundational elements are slowly eroded, new revelations replace those that were taken away. Lost ceremonies are replaced with new ones. Through the objects and associations it represents, “Nicho” is a ceremony that remembers those losses and celebrates the need for new rituals.
Boxspace is a wooden white box on casters measuring eleven feet wide, six feet high and nineteen inches deep. It is a contemporary art initiative housed in a garage along an alleyway in Strathcona, a neighbourhood in Vancouver (Canada). Each year an artist is invited to occupy Boxspace with an installation.
May 28, 2022 until September 2022
"laro na tayo - let's play" is a performance that invites participation. "laro na tayo" means "let's play" in Tagalog and introduces "sipa", a pre-colonial childhood game played in the Philippines. Held at eight locations within the city of Vancouver, the precise date, time and venue for each performance will be announced at least one week prior. Please keep up-to-date by visiting this website.
"laro na tayo - let's play" is commissioned by the City of Vancouver Public Art Program. Visit their website by clicking the image below.
July 25th to August 31st, 2019
"3 Works" is an intimate exhibition of artworks at HoTam Press Gallery in the beautiful Mount Pleasant neighbourhood of Vancouver, Canada. For the first three weeks of the exhibition, the artist will install one work per week. After the installation of the third artwork, a reception will follow. All works will remain on view until the end of August. As the gallery specializes in literary-based works, the artist has chosen to show a selection of works from a series of bookworks and book-objects from a period spanning close to twenty years.
Please note the artist's reception is on Saturday, August 10th from 3 to 5pm. A small surprise awaits anyone who pops by.
For more information, please visit http://bookshopgallery.hotampress.com/. The image below is a sneak preview of one of the works being shown.
image: Proposed Layout for R.P., 2001, altered book and plexiglas cases
"Maluwalhati” is a project conceived for the Kamias Triennale organized by Patrick Cruz and Allison Collins in Quezon City, Philippines in June 2017. The postcard in an edition of 500 is a gestural object that is distributed freely, meant to be handed out then greeted with the word “maluwalhati”.
"Maluwalhati" is a faithful reproduction of one side of a postcard that was retrieved from the estate of the artist's mother, Melencia "Mely" de Guzman Sia. The postcard dated May 9, 1977 is a personal document relating to the experience of immigrating to Vancouver, Canada from Manila, Philippines. "Maluwalhati", meaning "safely", is often used in conjunction with traveling safely or wishing someone safe travels and was the only Tagalog word on the postcard that the artist needed help translating. "Maluwalhati" touches upon ...
... issues of migration and what is lost and gained during that process;
... the passage of time and how we need to renew our memories, and ...
... that the more things change, the more they remain the same.
With the ever increasing concern regarding the recent post-judicial "liquidation" of alleged drug dealers in the Philippines and the growing instability with conflicting political systems worldwide, there is all the more reason to watch our step and travel safely. Within the context of the artist's personal journey, "Maluwalhati" marks the 40th anniversary of his family's arrival in Canada.
The English translation reads as follows:
Dear Aunt Nitang and Aunt Chuling,
We arrived in Vancouver safely. The city is very beautiful and the weather is lovely. The people are good and very helpful. Marivic became dizzy due to the twenty hour airplane flight. I will write again.
Regards,
Ching and Mely
If you wish to receive a free postcard by mail, please send your name and complete mailing address through the "write me" option available on this website.
CBC Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's Crash Gallery is back for a second season starting February 5 at 9:30pm on CBC TV. In each of the 5 episodes of this art-based reality t.v. show, three talented artists of various disciplines go head-to-head against each other in a real-time creative arena, giving the audience a front row seat to the creative process.
Hosted by Sean O'Neill of the Art Gallery of Ontario, this new season also unfolds under the watchful eyes of accomplished Canadian art critics - conceptual artist Paul de Guzman, visual artist Syrus Marcus Ware and performance artist Bridget Moser. Read the interview below for more information:
As part of a series of public art projects initiated by the City of Vancouver Cultural Services, my proposal titled Vancouver Coastal: a nomad's guide to the floating world has been installed in various transit shelter locations within the city of Vancouver until June 12, 2016
above: transit shelter installation at Renfrew Street north of East 3rd Avenue
Vancouver Coastal: a nomad's guide to the floating world pretends to be a travel guide and a work of speculative storytelling. The image of jetsam washed up on the shore, supplemented by a visual quotation from a classical Japanese woodblock print, references contemporary nomadic life and the historic romanticism associated with it. Recent global events involving industrial and natural disasters, upheaval and migration, extreme weather patterns elsewhere and on our own West Coast shores leave an archaeological array of accidental artefacts washing up on shorelines along the Pacific. The shoreline is a point of transmission of cultures and objects and stories. Regardless of whether these stories are truth, fiction or somewhere in between, they nonetheless allow us to share our experiences.
For more information, please visit OurCityOurArt.wordpress.com.