Gary Ross Pastrana

Gary-Ross Pastrana’s art has been one of the most persistent in terms of combining concepts with objects. His conceptual pieces, although loaded with poetic intensity, remain unobtrusively subtle and even almost quaint in its appearance. Coiled or folded photographs, his woven tales from found pictures in the internet, the sawed off parts of a boat shipped to another gallery, his shirt tied into a pole to commensurate a flag, these are the slightest of turns Gary-Ross has his objects make to create a new text within.

 

Born in 1977 in Manila, he received his Bachelor’s degree in Painting from the University of the Philippines and was handed with the Dominador Castaneda Award for Best Thesis, and was granted with residency programs in Japan and Bangkok. Gary-Ross Pastrana received the CCP Thirteen Artists Award in 2006. He has shown at the Singapore Art Museum, Metropolitan Museum of the Philippines, and the Jorge B. Vargas Museum. He was the country’s representative for the New Museum in New York’s 2012 Triennial “The Ungovernables.” He was part of the Aichi Triennale in 2010 and the Busan Biennale in 2008. Pastrana recently completed a residency program at the NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore. He is one of the cofounders of Future Prospects Art Space and has regularly curated for shows both here and abroad.