Carlos Villa

Bio

Carlos Villa (1936 - 2013) was a San Francisco-born visual artist, grass-roots activist, curator, author, and 40+ year educator at the San Francisco Art Institute, among other Bay Area institutions. His artistic origin story is often attributed to a single moment during his early education, when a professor told Villa, “Filipino art history does not exist.” A decade later, Villa abandoned a career in minimalism to begin his ground-breaking practice of culling materials from indigenous cultures across the globe. He collided feathers, bone, physical body prints, and sperm to create strangely-human works that challenged colonial perspectives and laid radical claim to a cross-cultural, diasporic identity. It was Villa’s chess move to render Filipino art history visible and incarnate a foundation for artists to come.

In 2022, Villa received the first-ever major museum retrospective dedicated to the work of a Filipino American artist, which toured bi-coastly from the Newark Museum of Art to the San Francisco Arts Commission Galleries and Asian Art Museum. Additional accolades include Villa’s 2011 solo retrospective Manongs, Some Doors and a Bouquet of Crates at the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts in San Francisco, and Other Sources: An American Essay, a multidisciplinary, multiethnic exhibition centered around women and artists of color, curated by Villa and presented in conjunction with the 1976 American Bicentennial. A selection of Villa’s work will be on view at Silverlens’s booth at Frieze New York 2023.

Image: Family photos of Carlos Villa, courtesy the Estate of Carlos Villa and Silverlens, Manila and New York.

Carlos Villa (1936 - 2013) was a San Francisco-born visual artist, grass-roots activist, curator, author, and 40+ year educator at the San Francisco Art Institute, among other Bay Area institutions. His artistic origin story is often attributed to a single moment during his early education, when a professor told Villa, “Filipino art history does not exist.” A decade later, Villa abandoned a career in minimalism to begin his ground-breaking practice of culling materials from indigenous cultures across the globe. He collided feathers, bone, physical body prints, and sperm to create strangely-human works that challenged colonial perspectives and laid radical claim to a cross-cultural, diasporic identity. It was Villa’s chess move to render Filipino art history visible and incarnate a foundation for artists to come.

In 2022, Villa received the first-ever major museum retrospective dedicated to the work of a Filipino American artist, which toured bi-coastly from the Newark Museum of Art to the San Francisco Arts Commission Galleries and Asian Art Museum. Additional accolades include Villa’s 2011 solo retrospective Manongs, Some Doors and a Bouquet of Crates at the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts in San Francisco, and Other Sources: An American Essay, a multidisciplinary, multiethnic exhibition centered around women and artists of color, curated by Villa and presented in conjunction with the 1976 American Bicentennial. A selection of Villa’s work will be on view at Silverlens’s booth at Frieze New York 2023.

Image: Family photos of Carlos Villa, courtesy the Estate of Carlos Villa and Silverlens, Manila and New York.

Video

Artist's Feet
1979
10226
1
Paper pulp and feathers
7.2h x 4.8w x 15d in • 18h x 12.2w x 38.1d cm
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Tattoo Drawing (Tatu Series)
1971
10227
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Ink on Itek photograph
21.6h x 13.2w in • 54.9h x 33.5w cm
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Excavation
1982
10228
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Acrylic on unstretched canvas with chicken bones
94.8h x 124.8w in • 240.8h x 317w cm
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My Roots
1970
10229
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Acrylic with feathers on unstretched canvas
91.5h x 92.9w in • 232.41h x 236w cm
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Ladders
1) Untitled “who listens”
2) Untitled “uncle is humiliated and stays silent”
3) Untitled “auntie comparing her child when there is no comparison”
2004
10233
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Bronze ladders with engravings
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1.) 288h x 12w in • 731.5h x 30.5w cm
2.) 177h x 12w in • 449.58h x 30.5w cm
3.) 175.2h x 12w in • 445h x 30.5w cm
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Third Coat
1977
10234
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Feathers and acrylic on canvas; bone dolls and acrylic on taffeta
81.6h x 80.4w x 9.6d in • 207.3h x 204.2w x 24.4 cm
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Artist's Head
1979
10237
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Paper pulp, feathers, bones, hair, and rags
14.4h x 14.4w x 8.4d in • 36.6h x 36.6w x 21.3d cm
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New Heights
1999
10230
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Acrylic on wood panel with engraved aluminum
24h x 24w x 1.5d in • 61h x 61w x 3.8d cm
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Kite God Coat
1979
10235
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Feathers and acrylic on canvas; bone dolls and acrylic on taffeta
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Painted Cloak
1971
10241
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Acrylic on canvas with painted taffeta and feathers (rooster, domestic turkey, common pheasants, domestic chicken)
62.4h x 129.6w x 8.4d in • 158.496h x 329.2w x 21.3d cm
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Untitled Drawings
ca 1960
10238
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ink on paper
various dimensions
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Surrender Monkey
1978
10232
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Aluminum and threded rod, paper, pulp, feathers (goose, domestic chicken)
28.8h x 28.8w x 39.6d in • 73.2h x 73.2w x 100.6d cm
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Orange-a-boom
2010
10236
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Scored lines though acrylic on wood, hardware
72h x 60w in • 182.9h x 152.4w cm (closed) 72h x 120w in • 182.9h x 304.8w cm (open)
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Selected Exhibitions

Selected Press

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