Curatorial Notes

In the same room where Jigger Cruz works on his pieces for the Art Fair are a tangle of wires and boxy machines that he uses to play his own electro-mechanical music. By his side is his four-year old daughter, playing with her own art materials and beaming delight in her own creation.

All these factors are seen in Cruz’ new series of compositions as he sculpts layers upon layers of paint to build sculptural forms that step out of the canvas. His objective is simplification and appreciation of the purity of shapes and textures: “This is a new phase of my process—like maneuvering the techniques in an inverted way than what I usually do.”

Cruz sees his visual work as parallel to his music and obsesses over sound the same way he obsesses over visual elements. “These vibrations are the same sensations I get when I do abstract painting,” Cruz’ shares. Much like his visual work, his type of abstract music does not have a preset: “it is made up of trials and errors and bears the history in its layers. Whatever you do, you cannot replicate what you created."

In both practices, he embraces the unexpected ways that elements interact, sculpting paint and sounds as they give in to factors that are out of one’s control. Cruz finds pleasure in seeing the paint fall when gravity participates. “I enjoy painting without doing sketches and plans, it’s like problem solving: spontaneous and organic.

This is also why he likes painting with his daughter. “I am inspired by her energy: the joy that she feels, her connection with her intuition, and the way she sees beauty in the basic forms,” Cruz describes this as his ideal state as an artist. “Children do not make art for shows, we do not make it for a deadline. We just want to create.”

Cruz’ work, in its instinctive gestures, demonstrates a freedom from the need to conform to the demands of society. “I am not a storyteller, I am a painter, and this is my personal approach. Sometimes I feel like I am being greedy because I paint for myself. But for me, success as an artist is to be able to do what I want now. Success is the freedom to become a child again.”

Cruz recalls how he started making art during a time when people were skeptical of painting as a career and barely had expectations to sell. “I have enjoyed this style of painting ever since. Even without the promise of the market, this is still what I will be doing.”

Words by Carla Gamalinda

About the Artist

Jigger Cruz (b. 1984) is a Filipino artist widely recognized on the international stage for his distinctive aesthetic and tactile materiality.

His early work embodies a laborious process painting figurative impressions that reference classical art history, then employing a methodology of defacement through impasto, spray paint, and action painting.

Cruz’s recent work features novel visual principles characterized by dense oil paint now in the form of sculptural cut-outs in ambiguous geometry, with a thickness that creates shadows within the painting, likened to an assemblage of textures and forms. He departs from former art historical associations, delving into detached explorations of space. The work is displayed with deliberate exposure of stretcher bars, continuing to pursue the notion that a painting doubles as an installation. As a color-blind artist, Cruz displays a sensitivity to the temperature of hues with new shades forming an effervescent composition that sheds past dread and umbra, now veering toward a sense of light.

Jigger Cruz has exhibited significant presentations across Europe and Asia. He studied Fine Arts at the Far Eastern University in the Philippines.