#yeokaa
A View from Inside
The romantic notion of home paints it as a nurturing, safe place; a haven or refuge from tensions that disturb the outside world. It is a space of comfort and belonging, of warmth and affection. It is where one feels at ease the most, and as the old cliché goes, a place like no other.
In this exhibition, Yeo Kaa unsettles the sense of security and content felt at home through an outward gaze that exposes the perils and menaces hidden or distant from one’s comfortable abode. The phrase “from the comfort of my own home” draws irony from the stark contrast between inside and outside conditions, with the outside as the site of danger and harsh realities of life. Central to this opposition is the attempt to confront the vantage point of a privileged existence—being sheltered or immune from the difficulties and suffering of others by virtue of one’s social position. The home here refers not only to the immediate household, but extends to larger communities—from posh apartment buildings to gated, self-contained residential zones—which similarly detach society’s privileged few from the experiences of the common people. Recent events, such as the ongoing pandemic and the string of calamities that besieged the artist’s native Philippines, have rendered the disparity between the lives of the rich and the poor more pronounced. The works interrogate this gap and the former’s filtered encounter of the latter’s struggles.
The disjuncture among lived realities shaped by social inequality is conveyed in the glass enclosures that blur the depicted imagery in each work. On a remote control’s cue, clear images of natural calamities like floods and forest fires, pollution and environmental decay, are revealed, shifting the audience back and forth between the shielded view of privilege and the more vivid and gripping accounts of difficult life out there. Like the white overlay that covers the scenes of tragedies and devastations behind it, privilege may sanitize one’s picture of reality and disengage us from the plight of society’s margins. These pieces remind us to constantly assess the lenses through which we access the wider world, and to look beyond our positionalities that may conceal truths outside the convenience of our social spheres.
–N.M. Marquez
FROM THE COMFORT OF MY OWN HOME
Yavuz Gallery
04.12.2020
Rage in Technicolor
Her palette and figuration may at first mislead viewers into thinking they have stumbled upon a festive gathering of happy thoughts, cutesy musings, and innocent wonder. This impression quickly fades as the compositions reveal content ranging from the dark and troubling, to gloomy and depressing—nothing naïve nor cheerful about them. Gripping with details such as mutilated body parts, infliction of pain, suicide, or episodes of anxiety and distress, the works of Yeo Kaa actually deals with the darker side of life, just candy-coated with pastel and luminous shades, and told using doll-figured tableaux. While drawing mostly from personal narratives, the imagery of her art converses easily with common human experiences, thus expanding into broader reflections about humanity and society.
In this set of works, she alludes to the some bitter realities of contemporary life, particularly its extremely competitive nature and the drive of greed that creates exploitative relations and systems. We live in a world in which everything has a price tag, suggested in the paintings by a list where animal meat and humans go together on sale, and a head likewise packed and appraised. Milking cash out of the individual knows no limit: even in a lifeless state, a cadaver with torso ripped open generates money as someone poses a snapshot with it. From the poses, gestures, and expressions of other figures combined with recurring scribblings of texts, what emerges is a feeling of betrayal and exhaustion, a rant and protest that one has been sucked dry and has had enough. A call for escape seems to linger; a denouncement of a vicious cycle.
These pieces could remind us that the ugly side of a society ruled by the game of survival of the fittest is oftentimes made more covert and clandestine by an enticing, attractive façade, just like how the intense confrontation between a fed-up persona and the exploitative system depicted in the works is partly concealed by their colors and stylization. They may also imply the very ills of a consumer society in which the glossy and glittering promise of material goods, luxuries, wealth, and possession is what pushes individuals to turn cunning and exploit. But this appearance of a pleasant surface may also be a strength. Striking and eye-catching, it allows the voice that rejects the system to be more amplified.
Text by N.M. Marquez
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Anxious Lustless Pechay
Filipino artist Yeo Kaa takes a turn in her explorations of the monsters that torment the human psyche and plays on disruptions to bodily craving for pleasure in her latest solo exhibition. The works confront female loss of sexual drive due to stress and anxiety through metaphors and references to the body. The word “pechay” in the title refers to Chinese cabbage, one of the euphemisms for female genitalia in her local slang, and is described in a state when it ceases to respond to self-pleasure. Images of sex toys, underwear, and a girl in nude seemingly in distress nonchalantly open up discussions on desire and sexuality. In this instance of loss of lust, the works indirectly become the artist’s outlet, a purging akin to an orgasmic experience that restores the body and mind’s natural vitality and responsiveness of the senses.
Known for her eye-candy colors and figuration style reminiscent of cartoons and animations, Yeo Kaa is a young Filipino artist whose works’ themes and subjects contrast sharply from the pop vibe evoked by her imagery. A graduate of Advertising from the College of the Holy Spirit in Manila, she has exhibited widely in the Philippines and has participated in international residencies, in Jogjakarta, Indonesia, and Haukijarvi, Finland. She is particularly interested in dark themes such as depression, suicide, and anxiety, among others, both drawn from personal experiences as well as general observations of human tendencies.
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Dry and Confused 2
Acrylic on Canvas
5 x 4 ft.
2018
s̶o̶r̶r̶y̶
s̶o̶r̶r̶y̶
s̶o̶r̶r̶y̶
by: Ryan Reyes
2018
Yeo Kaa’s latest suite of works draws from her own experiences and opens up fragments of memories from a recent past. In her artistic oeuvre, semi-autobiographical narratives are often woven with an assortment of literal and metaphorical imagery dealing with dark themes, such as violence, depression, and anxiety. The resulting compositions then straddle dynamically between reality and fiction, factual and imaginary. This collection takes cue from such personal take on self-expression as the artist offers a glimpse of troubled moments from a failed relationship.
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The works revolve around the trope of agony, both mental and emotional. Each canvas narrates an episode in an ordeal involving a couple, seen as a pair of light and dark figures. Distress and agony are indicated in the clearly-rendered facial features of the light figure, dominated by large, teary eyes. The dark figure in contrast appears as an almost a solid silhouette defined by black smudges, devoid of facial expression implying an attitude of indifference towards the partner. The images paint a picture of a companionship where one is led to a state that undermines self-worth, an unhealthy dependency in which one takes on a manipulative and abusive role while the other becomes a submissive victim trapped in a cycle of pain and suffering. This is perhaps an all-too familiar tale of a relationship doomed to failure that everyone dreads. The titles are loaded with ironies while texts written within the works highlight further the artist’s thoughts and sentiments, and together they reveal situations that crippled the blossoming of an otherwise happy ending.
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Suggesting redemption, the exhibit’s title reads as a string of apologetic words interrupted by a strikethrough, a gesture that attempts to erase regrets that may come from closing a life chapter. It is a line that crosses out previous mistakes and seeks to regain everything that is lost after a period of enduring suffering, a mark that purges what needs to be forgotten and obliterated as one starts life anew.
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For My Mother
A show dedicated to her beloved mother, Yeo Kaa’s upcoming solo exhibition centers on flowers—a subject which the artist is not so fond of but one especially favored by her mom. In a gesture of endearment, she embraces the subject and creates an environment filled with blossoms while weaving in other aspects of her personal recollection of the woman that inspired the show. The dazzling display of colors that has always characterized her art merges into an array of organic folds and curves defining petals, and further animated by a tinge of sentimentality and affection. The flowers come to life through paintings that highlight floral silhouettes, and numerous paper flowers with print. Fashioned out of paper, the mass of three-dimensional flowers reminds of a familiar craft but at the same time connects with the artist’s family business of printing.
Yeo Kaa graduated with an Advertising degree from the College of the Holy Spirit in Manila, and won the Grand Prize of the University of Santo Tomas On-the-Spot Painting Competition and Special Prize of the Metrobank Art and Design Excellence in 2010. In 2017, she was an artist-in-residence at Sarang Art Space in Jogjakarta, Indonesia, and Arteles Creative Center in Haukijärvi, Finland. The exhibition opens at Blanc Gallery, Katipunan Avenue, Quezon City on June 2 in cooperation with The Working Animals (TWA) Art Projects.
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THANK YOU, 2017
Acrylic on Canvas
4 x 5 ft.
2017
@yeokaa
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Thank you, 2017!!
I’m happier with myself.
Sometimes you just need to remove the negativity that’s dragging you down for you to go up.
Maraming salamat sa lahat ng tumulong sakin ngayong taon. Mahal ko kayong lahat
More inspirations and adventures to come! Aaanndd more struggles to overcome!
Happy New Year!! ✨
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Let’s Party! ‘Cause I Ain’t Sad No Mo’ !!!!!!
Ending a fruitful year with a bang, Yeo Kaa mounts a solo exhibition this December in celebration of all the good things and happy moments that marked her life for the past year. Like throwing a real party, she fills the show with paintings of merrymaking scenes expressing gratitude, and creates a festive mood through installations of balloons and neon lights. Since a party is not complete without a feast, she sets a table for the centerpiece with sculptural pieces that highlight the Filipino party eating experience—from lechon and halo-halo to barbecue and spaghetti. A thankful note to close a prolific year of artistic output, she deviates from the usual dark themes that characterize her art, focusing instead on the fun and the festive which has always been complementary to her choice of palette and figuration style. Expressing a cheerful vibe—sincerely devoid of irony between the lines often suggested in her past works—the exhibition just basks in gratefulness and positivity, a triumph over sadness and grief. It sends a message of counting one’s blessings and looking forward to great things yet to come.
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