Don Bryan Bunag
Bulacan, Philippines
Don Bryan Bunag (b. 1993) surveys and reframes identity through interpretations of spiritual and metaphysical landscapes that respond and embrace sensibilities related to memory, space, and time. Bunag’s practice center on the sentimentality of remembering through a series of carefully arranged mise-en-scène, which dominates his body of works. Forming these narratives, Bunag evens out every element in his compositions by using monochromatic colors that emphasize the neutrality of forms and release the work from any central figure or subject. Thus, dispensing the experience of looking at a canvas or the gallery space as the central landscape—seizing our sense of time in the images formed. Apart from narratives drawn from memory, Bunag re-imagines scenes from films and renders them into paintings and assemblages arresting motion, movement, and character. In doing so, the artist believes that time and self can be deconstructed and reconstructed through images, objects, and materials to help us understand and reflect on the notion of identity built through and defined by a cluster of landscapes.
Bunag was selected as the Grand Prize winner of the Metrobank Art and Design Excellence (MADE) in water-based category in 2015. He was a finalist at the following competitions and awards: Don Papa Rum National Painting Competition (2019); Art Renewal Center ARC Awards in New Jersey (2019, 2018); Special citation Metrobank Art and Design Excellence (2014); Grand Prize Winner, Vision Petron National Students Art Competition (2012, 2013), and the Gintong Kabataan Awards for Visual Arts (2013) in his hometown of Malolos. In 2019, he participated in the artist-in-residence program of CANVAS in Batangas. His works have been exhibited at the UP Vargas Museum, National Museum of the Philippines, Yuchengco Museum, Kohesi Initiatives (Yogyakarta), and a solo presentation at Art Fair Philippines (Ysobel Gallery) in 2018. He has been featured in exhibitions in the United States, Spain, and Indonesia. Bunag received his BFA (Visual Communication) from the Bulacan State University in 2014. He works and lives in Malolos, Bulacan.