Currently running at Kobayashi Gallery in Tokyo’s Minato district, “A Wild Sea” brings together 18 contemporary Filipino artists that draws from the poet Matsuo Bashō’s haiku, “A Wild Sea”:
A wild sea –
In the distance over Sado
The Milky Way
Opening with images of the boundless, untamed sea, and moving to the Milky Way’s celestial river of stars, the three-line poem evokes a connection between the vastness of the sky above and ocean below, as well as the earthly and celestial, all the while giving a sense of life’s cycle of birth, death, and renewal.
Curated by Patrick de Veyra and presented with Faculty Projects, “A Wild Sea” runs from June 12 to 21, 2025. The exhibition inspires a jumping point for images that meditate on nature’s chaos and calmness, as well as reference Sado Island, a place in Japan that has historical weight as a place of exile for “political dissidents, radical monks, and inconvenient minds,” as the curator writes.
Participating artists include Bjorn Calleja, Valerie Chua, Clarence Chun, de Veyra, Stephanie Frondoso, Celine Lee, Christina Lopez, Victoria Montinola, Raffy Napay, Sid Natividad, Gio Panlilio, Enzo Razon, Isabel Reyes Santos, Luis Antonio Santos, Soler Santos, Mr. S, Miguel Lorenzo Uy, and MM Yu.
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Masatoshi Kobayashi, owner of Kobayashi Gallery, reflects on the intercultural dialogue, “By participating in art fairs across Southeast Asia, we developed especially strong relationships with Filipino artists and gallerists,” he explains. “These encounters inspired us to deepen cultural and artistic exchange… Many Japanese viewers have had little opportunity to experience contemporary Filipino art until now.”
RG Gabunada of Faculty Projects sees the collaboration as expansion. “We learned to respond to different contexts and to make exploratory work,” he notes. “We hope to continue doing this in more places around the world.”
Echoes of the ocean
The exhibited works move between intimate and cosmic scales. Calleja presents a rare self-portrait, a departure from his typically anonymous humanoid figures, as he doubles himself in his characteristic hat, still peppered with his distinct miniature humanoid figures.
In Chua’s works, she presents enigmatic impressions of the ocean waves, layered with a smaller frame of a nude female figure holding up fabric on one arm. In another work, she paints an octopus strung up on hooks, creating a visceral connection to maritime life.
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With a practice that generally creates photorealistic depictions of water, Natividad’s current work for Kobayashi Gallery presents a frame of a blurred seascape, further obscured by the surface of bubbling water in what seems to be a meta-artistic gesture.
Several of the artists push material boundaries in explorations that reference water and the ocean. Lee’s “Times (Faultline I)” employs oxidizing copper paint and acidic solution on linen in chemical processes that almost seem to mirror saltwater’s corrosive properties.
Frondoso’s “Ecotone I” features image transfers of seascapes and multi-colored horizons that bring to mind sunsets and sunrises, now directly applied to found tile rubble, stimulating geological meditations on land-water boundaries.
For “A Wild Sea,” curator de Veyra contributes his own painting, which shows miniature abstractions on pebble-like forms that gloss over larger gestures, mixing acrylic with glitter and emulsion transfer.
Great depths
In many of the works, the depths of emotions in Bashō’s poetry pulse in the visual elements.
Enzo Razon’s works on Hahnemühle metallic paper collage Filipino figures caught in ecstatic expressions mid-song, showcasing the complex array of humanity and human emotion, as well as presenting to Japanese audiences such a ubiquitous activity of many Filipinos.
Mr. S presents a charming oil painting of a young swimmer at night, whose goggles reflect the starlit sky, connecting earthly night swims with cosmic wonder.
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Gio Panlilio’s contribution draws from mythological exile themes. “The diptych takes cues from the myth of Orpheus, drawing on the ever-present temptation of looking back and the endurance needed on a long and treacherous path,” Panlilio explains. “Through multiple exposures and layered collage, the images lean into scale and a sense of distance.”
Other works include Clarence Chun’s dynamic abstractions with oceanic hues, Victoria Montinola’s fittingly blue “Asul,” Raffy Napay’s textile work suggesting underwater foliage, and Christina Lopez’s miniature black-and-white impression of an eye that makes you gaze twice, among others.
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Like Bashō’s poetry, rooted in both movement and stillness, “A Wild Sea” looks beyond the horizon and into the depths of cultural exchange, suggesting that the ocean between Japan and the Philippines can be a site of universal language and specific cultural meaning.
And through 18 distinct voices, “A Wild Sea” charts new territory shaped by shared waters and histories, creating a dialogue on colonial history, migration, identity, and isolation. The exhibition, which explores the vastness of the ocean, shows that rather than distance, visual art can connect and bridge even the wildest seas.
“A Wild Sea” runs from June 12 to 21, 2025 at Kobayashi Gallery, 3F 1-15-13 Shiba, Minato-ku, Tokyo, Japan 105-0014
