Provenance: Provenance: Finale Art File, Makati City

ABOUT THE WORK

Filipinos are known as notorious fanatics of dramatic soap operas. Same with the actors and actresses wearing masks and playing different roles, the male figure wearing the barong proves to be the artist’s mockery for two-faced people and their excessive lifestyles, trying to portray a positive facade while concealing their empty and uncontented hearts. After returning from the United States in 2006, social realist Justiniani evidently developed his oeuvre through “magic realist strains” and moved to the nature of vision and their balanced relationship with time through the use of reflective media. This practice made his name more pronounced in the industry which paved the way for him to represent the Philippines in exhibitions and conferences overseas.