The NCCA Gallery, an institutional program of the National Commission on Art Galleries (NCAG) and National Committee on Visual Arts (NCVA), presents …As We, Constructs, a project by visual artists Ritche C. Yee and Marvin Angelo Rafols Oloris. Opening reception of the exhibition is on Monday, 12 March 2018 at four in the afternoon.

As the socio-political dictum of Build! Build! Build! engulfs our senses with ideations of development, change, and industrialization, the two artists are impelled to ‘imagineer’ congruent and altered environments by harnessing the patience of overlaying paint, ink and other materials amplified by the squareness of tools which they use in their daily grind. The artists’ works stream into two sensory ponds despite some astute similarity in technique: Yee crystallizes the duality of decomposition and tenacity of the things which already have been there and here; Meanwhile, Oloris transubstantiates unadulterated yet fractured and almost fragile visions of what has yet to be built. The exhibition of works of these two men essays to round out a variety of social truths, no matter how base, stolid, or distressing they may seem to be. It is hoped that these advocated truths ground how and why the artists themselves are evolving bricolages of interdisciplinary and mutable circumstances. Moreover, the project is just one ply among the interminable palitadas of ideas and subjectivities as the artists continue their performances, entitling them as fluent constructors among and of their generation, and as active critics against the precarity of their contemporary milieus.

Ritche C. YEE (b. 1974) finished in 2017 a Certificate in Fine Arts (Painting) at the University of the Philippines College of Fine Arts. Prior to this, he completed a Marketing degree from the Father Saturnino Urios University (FSUU) in Butuan City. His first solo presentation titled Sapot was shown at the University of the Philippines Los Baños in 2013. Yee won the Grand Prize for his Non-Representational work at the GSIS Art Competition in 2011. He was a Finalist of the 2015 Metrobank Art and Design for Excellence (MADE) Awards, Sculpture Category; 2013 TANAW: The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Art Competition; and 2009 Non-Representational Category of the GSIS Art Competition. He was also a Semi-Finalist of the 2010 edition of MADE Awards, Painting Category. He received the 2008 Jurors’ Choice Award of the Mixed Media Category of the Art Association of the Philippines (AAP) Art Competition. As a motivated visual artist, he was part of many group exhibitions in museums, galleries, commercial spaces, and academic institutions in Manila and its vicinities.

Marvin Angelo Rafols OLORIS (b. 1988) is the co-founder of MARO\Ortega Design, an engineering firm based in Cavite. He studies Civil Engineering at the University of the Philippines Los Baños. He participated in several exhibitions in Laguna, Cavite, and Manila, and was a featured artist in SPOT ART SINGAPORE in 2013. Oloris presented two solo shows prior to this two-man show with Yee. His keen interest in meteorology led him to take up specialized and self-paced MOOCs: Tropical Meteorology course at the COMET MetEd, University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR), broad topic course at the WW2010 program of University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and The Architectural Imagination course at Harvard University.

…As We, Constructs will be on view from 12 March until 3 April 2018. Viewing is from Monday to Sunday including holidays, 9am-6pm. Appointments for viewing can be done by sending a message to the NCCA Gallery at nccagallery09@gmail.com. Follow the NCCA Gallery’s Facebook page.