1. Wawi Navarroza
“I love [and sometimes detest] the Do-It-Yourself passionate insistence to bring out the idea no matter what,” says the ever-inquisitive Navarroza. She dives into her art with this mindset, believing that “for as long as [creators] maintain our right to freedom of expression in our views and opinions in whatever our chosen metier and art form is, the future holds for Filipino art”. To her, visual literacy is the ultimate goal. “In order for this to take place, exposure to art should be normalised, present in our everyday lives, or at least available around us,” she says.
Navarroza launched Thousandfold, a platform and library for contemporary photography and photobooks, with this goal in mind. As a multi-disciplinary artist, she is most popular for her photography. Her works have been seen around the world from the CCP, Singapore Art Museum 8Q, Hangaram Museum Korea, Museum Belvedere Netherlands and so many more.
Navarroza has won the Cultural Center of the Philippines’ Thirteen Artists Awards, Ateneo Art Awards, and Lumi Photographic Art Awards Helsinki. She was distinguished as a finalist for the Singapore Museum Signature Art Prize, the WMA Commission Hong Kong and the Sovereign Asian Art Prize 2018 too. On top of that Navarroza is also a published author of two books and is an educator.
Navarroza is part of a group exhibition titled “Tonight the Air is Warm” ongoing until 27 March, 2021 at Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery in London featuring key artists working with photography from South East Asia, curated by Tolla Duke Sloane. She is also working on a future solo exhibition set for November 2021, in London. Wawi Navarroza is represented by Silverlens Galleries and is currently based in Istanbul.