Pio Abad

Pio Abad (b. 1983, Manila) is a Filipino artist living and working in London. His work is concerned with the personal and political entanglements of objects. Deeply informed by the modern history of the Philippines, where the artist was born and raised, his work reflects on the role of family both as archive and agent, and uses strategies of appropriation to mine alternative or repressed historical events, unravel official accounts, and draw out threads of complicity between incidents, ideologies and people.

His solo exhibitions include “Fear of Freedom Makes Us See Ghosts”, Ateneo Art Gallery, Manila (2022); “Kiss the Hand You Cannot Bite”, Kadist, San Francisco (2019); “Splendour”, Oakville Galleries, Ontario (2019); “Notes on Decomposition”, Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow (2016); “1975 – 2015”, 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney and “Some Are Smarter Than Others”, Gasworks, London (2014). Recent group exhibitions include “Things Entangling”, Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo (2020); “Phantom Limb”, Jameel Arts Centre, Dubai (2019); “To Make Wrong/Right/Now”, 2nd Honolulu Biennial, Hawaii (2019); “Imagined Nations/ Modern Utopias”, 12th Gwangju Biennial, Korea (2018).

He is currently part of “Is it morning for you yet?”, The 58th Carnegie International, Pittsburgh (2022), and will be part of “In Our Veins Flow Ink and Fire”, 5th Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Kochi, India (2022).

Abad’s works are part of a number of collections including Tate, UK; Kadist, Paris/San Francisco and Art Jameel, Dubai. He has also curated exhibitions at Museum of Contemporary Art and Design, Manila; Spike Island, Bristol and Jameel Arts Centre, Dubai. Abad is also the curator of the estate of his aunt, the Filipino American artist Pacita Abad.