Suffering is Good Drawing

Christian Ray Villanueva was born in Cadiz City, Negros Occidental in 1998 and is a student at the University of the Philippines Fine Arts Cebu, taking Studio Arts. He first came to prominence as an artist in his first solo show “Chasing Chaos” at The Art District and was featured in the StarLife section of the Visayan Daily Star newspaper in 2018. Since then he has been catapulted to become part of multiple group shows in Bacolod, Cebu and Manila. His practices often fluctuate between many mediums of expression and mainly involves various forms of media. Using music, printmaking, painting, drawing, illustration, performance, writing, photography and film, to transform his life experiences into art. His content primarily features his personal and often tragic experiences with cancer, trauma, family, abandonment, relationships, sex, death, his candid experiences on coming of age as a gay person, living with a disability and climate activism. Examples of his wide repertoire of work are his monoprint drawings which are inspired by his own circumstances. Blurring the line between irony versus truth, they are autobiographical, and scribbled with raw conviction. Another example of his introspective work is “Get The F**k Out of My Mind (Crucifix)” which is a photograph of the artist’s naked mutilated body, cheekily wearing “BioFresh” underwear. It was first exhibited at The House of Frida and later on at Project20 gallery in 2019. He relocated to Cebu for his academic studies at The University of The Philippines and has made solid preparations to continue his art education in Belgium in 2022. He went on to make the mixed media work “In A Thousand Years” featured at the Jose Joya Awards 2020 exhibition as a protest on how persons with disabilities are treated in regards to the climate emergency and the green movement. In regards to film, he has produced “2011 Superstar” shown at the UP Cebu campus with explicit details on a period of recovery from cancer. He has shown particular interest in writing, and has produced a zine for VIVA-EXCON Roxas in 2018, containing his early poetry and diaries entitled “Time Became A Friend”. As a curator, he has done “To Common Things”, a group exhibition featuring a collection of paintings for Purveyor in 2019 and most recently in 2020, “Muni Muni” for Block 17 Art Space, a group show composing of 12 various artists from different backgrounds.