ASHMOLEAN NOW: PIO ABAD
ASHMOLEAN NOW: PIO ABAD
TO THOSE SITTING IN DARKNESS
** Shortlisted for the Turner Prize 2024**
FREE EXHIBITION
Open until 8 Sep 2024
Gallery 8
Admission is FREE
The second in the Ashmolean NOW exhibition series, where contemporary artists are invited to create new work inspired by the Ashmolean’s historical collections.
This exhibition, entitled To Those Sitting in Darkness, features new drawings and objects by London-based artist Pio Abad (b.1983). Pio Abad has been shortlisted for the 2024 Turner Prize for his Ashmolean NOW exhibition.
Deeply informed by the history of the world and particularly the Philippines, where Abad was born and raised, his works draw out transnational lines between historical incidents and people, and our lives today.
Inside the exhibition gallery © Ashmolean Museum / Hannah Pye
Concerned with colonial history and cultural loss, Abad’s works are exhibited together with select works by other artists and ‘diasporic’ objects from Oxford collections, chosen by the artist.
The title ‘To Those Sitting in Darkness’ is a reference to American writer Mark Twain’s satire ‘To the Person Sitting in Darkness’ (1901), which strongly criticised imperialism.
Abad views the exhibition as an 'act of illumination that puts unexamined histories on display and addresses objects that have been confined to the margins of telling.'
Header image: Giolo's Lament, Pio Abad, 2023 © Pio Abad
BEHIND-THE-SCENES ARTIST FILM
MEET PIO ABAD
https://www.youtube.com/embed/qYmksVRivFw?rel=0&cc_load_policy=1
ARTWORKS IN THE SHOW
'Portrait of Prince Giolo, Son of King Moangis', John Savage, 1692
Tat2, Carlos Villa, 1971
I am singing a song that can only be borne after losing a country, Pio Abad, 2023
Powhatan's Mantle, c.1600–1628
Decorated knife, sheath and belt made in the Philippines, 19th century, shown on Sinagtala woven fabrics {detail), 2017
For the Sphinx, Pio Abad and Frances Wadsworth Jones, 2023
1897.76.36.18.6 No.3, drawings (one of 14), Pio Abad, 2023
1897.76.36.18.6 No.4, drawings (one of 14), Pio Abad, 2023
Facsimile of Sacrificial altar, George le Clerc Egerton, Benin, 1897
About Ashmolean NOW
Each exhibition in the series focuses on a different artistic medium, while linking the past and the present. The first Ashmolean NOW exhibition showed paintings by Flora Yukhnovich and Daniel Crews-Chubb. The second currently shows Pio Abad who works across several media and has been recently nominated for the Turner Prize 2024, with Bettina von Zwehl coming in October 2024.
EXHIBITION-RELATED TOURS & EVENTS
PRESS
Read the press release about Pio Abad's exhibition being shortlisted for the Turner Prize 2024
To contact the Press Office please click here
Exhibition supported by:
Ampersand Foundation
Christian Levett
Mercedes U. Zobel
The Patrons of the Ashmolean Museum
and those who wish to remain anonymous