Jon Cuyson to Represent Philippines at 2026 Venice Biennale with 'Sea of Love'

Filipino artist Jon Cuyson will represent the Philippines at the 61st Venice Biennale, which runs from 9 May to 22 November 2026. His installation, 'Sea of Love / Dagat ng Pag-ibig', is housed in the Arsenale and combines painting, sculpture, sound, and moving image. The work features fragmented freestanding painting panels with gestural marks, geometric abstraction, metal hardware, cast resin mussels, and marine debris. Central to the piece is Kerel, a queer Filipino time-traveling seafarer from Cuyson's Kerel Trilogy films, alongside his trans lover Mutya and his mother Nanay Cleo, a blind folk healer. The installation also premieres 'Sea of Echoes', a film narrated from the perspective of mussels in a farm in Cavite City, Manila Bay, addressing invisible maritime labor. Cuyson describes his conceptual framework as 'mussel thinking', focusing on filtration, clustering, and sedimentation. He cites David Medalla as the most important Filipino artist, praising his open, mobile practice. Cuyson sees the national pavilion as a porous space that can hold multiple histories without collapsing into a single narrative, reflecting the Philippines' archipelagic identity shaped by water and migration.