Manuel Ocampo (born 1965) is a
Filipino artist. His work fuses sacred
Baroque
The Baroque ( , , ) is a Western Style (visual arts), style of Baroque architecture, architecture, Baroque music, music, Baroque dance, dance, Baroque painting, painting, Baroque sculpture, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished from ...
religious iconography with secular political narrative. His works draw upon a wide range of art historical references, contain cartoonish elements, and draw inspiration from
punk subculture
The punk subculture includes a diverse and widely known array of Punk rock, music, Punk ideologies, ideologies, Punk fashion, fashion, and other forms of expression, Punk visual art, visual art, dance, Punk literature, literature, and film. La ...
.
[Casin, Pam Brooke A]
"Manuel Ocampo: iconoclasm personified."
''Manila Bulletin Publishing.'' 31 Jan 2010 (retrieved 16 Aug 2010)
Background
Manuel Ocampo was born in the
Philippines
The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...
. He studied fine arts at the
University of the Philippines
The University of the Philippines (UP; ) is a Higher education in the Philippines#State universities and colleges, state university system in the Philippines. It is the country's national university, as mandated by List of Philippine laws, Re ...
, then moved to
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...
in the 1980s, where he studied at the
California State University
The California State University (Cal State or CSU) is a Public university, public university system in California, and the List of largest universities and university networks by enrollment, largest public university system in the United States ...
.
[ Ocampo has since moved to back to Manila living with his wife and children. ]["Manuel Ocampo, God is my Copilot."]
''City Projects.'' (retrieved 16 Aug 2010)
Art career
Ocampo frequently revisits and makes reference to the art historical canon of political allegorists including Leon Golub
Leon Golub (January 23, 1922 – August 8, 2004) was an American painter. He was born in Chicago, Illinois, where he also studied, receiving his BA at the University of Chicago in 1942, and his BFA and MFA at the School of the Art Institute ...
, Géricault, Goya
Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (; ; 30 March 1746 – 16 April 1828) was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker. He is considered the most important Spanish artist of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His paintings, drawings, an ...
, Daumier with allusions to contemporary figures including political satirist R. Crumb
Robert Dennis Crumb (; born August 30, 1943) is an American artist who often signs his work R. Crumb. His work displays a nostalgia for American folk culture of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and satire of contemporary American c ...
Modernist painter Philip Guston
Philip Guston (born Phillip Goldstein, June 27, 1913 – June 7, 1980) was a Canadian American painter, printmaker, muralist and draftsman. "Guston worked in a number of artistic modes, from Renaissance-inspired figuration to formally accomplis ...
. Ocampo's dark, often disturbing Gothic paintings are attributed with transforming horror into exquisite beauty, history into art history, purgatory into salvation. One of his pieces featuring several swastika
The swastika (卐 or 卍, ) is a symbol used in various Eurasian religions and cultures, as well as a few Indigenous peoples of Africa, African and Indigenous peoples of the Americas, American cultures. In the Western world, it is widely rec ...
s was censored at the Dokumenta art show in Kassel, Germany.[
Manuel Ocampo has exhibited extensively throughout the 1990s, with solo exhibitions at galleries and institutions through Europe, Asia, and the Americas. In 2005, his work was the subject of a large-scale survey at Casa Asia in Barcelona, and Lieu d’Art Contemporain, Sigean, France.
Ocampo's work has been included in a number of international surveys, including the 2004 ''Seville Biennale'', 2001 '']Venice Biennale
The Venice Biennale ( ; ) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy. There are two main components of the festival, known as the Art Biennale () and the Venice Biennale of Architecture, Architecture Biennale (), ...
'', the 2001 ''Berlin Biennale
The Berlin Biennale (full name: Berlin Biennale für zeitgenössische Kunst, Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art) is a contemporary art exhibition, which has been held at various locations in Berlin, Germany, every two to three years since 1998. ...
'', the 2000 ''Biennale d’art Contemporain de Lyon'', the 1997 ''Kwangju Biennial'', the 1993 Corcoran Biennial, and 1992's controversial ''Documenta IX.'' His work was featured in many group shows in the 1990s, including ''Helter Skelter: LA Art of the 1990s'', at Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MOCA) is a contemporary art museum with two locations in greater Los Angeles, California. The main branch is located on Grand Avenue in Downtown Los Angeles, near the Walt Disney Concert Hall. MOCA's ori ...
in 1992; ''Asia/America: Identities in Contemporary Asian American Art'' at the Asia Society
The Asia Society is a 501(c)(3) organization that focuses on educating the world about Asia. It has several centers in the United States (Manhattan, Washington, D.C., Houston, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle) and around the world (Hong Ko ...
, New York in 1994; ''American Stories: Amidst Displacement and Transformation'' at Setagaya Art Museum, Tokyo in 1997; ''Pop Surrealism'' at the Aldrich Museum of Artin 1998; and ''Made in California: Art, Image, and Identity, 1900-2000'' at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits (George C. Page Museum).
LACMA was founded in 1961 ...
in 2000. He has received a number of prestigious grants and awards, including the Giverny Residency (1998), the Rome Prize
The Rome Prize is awarded by the American Academy in Rome, in Rome, Italy. Approximately thirty scholars and artists are selected each year to receive a study fellowship at the academy. Recipients must be American citizens. Prizes have been aw ...
at the American Academy (1995–96), National Endowment for the Arts
The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the feder ...
(1996), Pollock-Krasner Foundation
The Pollock-Krasner Foundation was established in 1985 for the purpose of providing funding to visual artists internationally to further their artistic practices. It was established at the bequest of Lee Krasner, who was an American abstract expr ...
(1995) and Art Matters Inc. (1991).
It is important to note that Manuel Ocampo used to make art that criticized western colonialism through allegory and metaphor. Today, his work displays simple imagery; the artist has said of his 1990s work, "I was bored with that shit".[
Phillip Rodriguez directed a one-hour documentary of Ocampo's life and art career, ''Manuel Ocampo, God Is My Copilot''.][
Ocampo's 1992 painting "Why I Hate Europeans" was used as the cover art to the music album " Mythmaker" by ]Skinny Puppy
Skinny Puppy was a Canadian electro-industrial band formed in Vancouver in 1982. The group was among the founders of the industrial rock and electro-industrial genres. Initially envisioned as an experimental side-project by cEvin Key (Kevin Crom ...
. Ocampo's art was also used for the album artwork for "Red Hot + Latin" - from the Red Hot series of benefit albums.
Notes
Further reading
*
External links
Manuel Ocampo
The Artist.org: Manuel Ocampo
Shark's Ink.com: Manuel Ocampo
Paule Anglim: Manuel Ocampo
Salander O'Reilly/Fred Hoffman: Manuel Ocampo
Art Contemporain: Manuel Ocampo
Sprueth Magers Projekte: Manuel Ocampo
49th Venice Biennale
The 49th Venice Biennale, held in 2001, was an exhibition of international contemporary art, with 65 participating nations. The Venice Biennale takes place biennially in Venice, Italy. Prizewinners of the 49th Biennale included: Richard Serra a ...
Asian-American Film Database: Manuel Ocampo
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ocampo, Manuel
21st-century Filipino artists
Filipino painters
Filipino satirists
1965 births
Living people