León Gallery wishes to thank the artist for confirming the authenticity of this lot

Literature: Villegas, Ramon N. and Lisa Guerrero Nakpil. Houses: A Collection of Paintings of Philippine Houses. Makati City: Januario Jesus B. Atencio and 8990 Holdings, Inc., 2017. Fullcolor photograph on page 96 and painting description and essay on page 97.

ABOUT THE WORK

by RAMON N. VILLEGAS Mark O. Justiniani was born in 1966, in Bacolod City, Negros Occidental. He took up Arts Education at the College of Fine Arts, University of the Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City. California-based at one time, the artist is one of the country’s most talented surrealist painters. A multiawarded artist in almost all national art competitions, he was included in the Thirteen Artists Awards of the Cultural Center of the Philippines in 1994. Justiniani has represented the Philippines in various international conferences, workshops, and exhibitions. Justiniani is known for attention to his craft and informed, prolific imagination Justiniani belonged to various artists’ collectives, first with ABAY (1987 – 1990), Grupong Salingpusa (1986 – 1992), and the Sanggawa art collective (1995 – 1998). These groups were known for large-scale murals, particularly the “Karnabal” mural project, commissioned with a grant to Salingpusa by the Cultural Center of the Philippines for the Philippine Centennial mural project that the Office of the President commissioned in 1998 for the Malacañang Heroes’ Hall (measuring 6.5 ft. x 8.4 ft.). Through the years, aside from group and solo shows in various galleries in Manila and other Philippine cities, his work has been exhibited in San Francisco and Los Angeles, California: Brisbane, Adelaide, and Sydney in Australia; Tokyo and Yokohama in Japan; Denmark, Kuala Lumpur, and Singapore. Justiniani’s talent has been amply recognized with the Grand Prize, 7th Metrobank National Painting Competition (1990); 13 Artists Awards, Cultural Center of the Philippines (1994), the Jurors Choice Award, Philip Morris Group of Companies, Philippine Art Awards (1999) and Finalist (2000); and Award for Continuing Excellence in the Arts, Metrobank Foundation, Manila (2004). Recently, Justiniani has been experimenting, quite successfully, with multiple reflective images in enclosed and lighted mirrors that create the illusion of infinite vistas and points of view. In this earlier, surreal work, Justiniani’s central image is a birdhouse-shaped clock poised over a male figure’s head. He is confused: one eye is pointing upward, the other downcast. He does not know where to look, where to go. The hands of the device are pointing quite close to 12 o’clock, the symbolic hora de peligro, or turning point. Where the nagging timekeeper would emerge is a Madonna figure, clutching an infant: the time to make a decision is at hand. (Essay taken from the book ‘Houses: A Collection of Paintings of Philippine Houses’ by Ramon N. Villegas and Lisa Guerrero Nakpil. Published by Januario Jesus B. Atencio and 8990 Holdings, Inc., 2017)