Augusto Albor (b. 1948)

Untitled (Ether Series)

signed and dated 2000 (lower left)

mixed media

72” x 108” (183 cm x 274 cm)

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The paring down process, economy of form, and luminous light were championed by the country’s foremost abstractionists Fernando Zobel, Arturo
Luz, and Leandro Locsin. The younger generation of abstract artists such as Augusto Albor continue to adhere to minimalist aesthetics, zen-like stillness,
and clean illusionary space. Albor is among the accomplished abstractionists during the eighties—
like Lao Lianben, Norberto Carating, and Edwin Wilwayco—who was regularly invited to participate in group exhibitions abroad.

Through his abstract works, Albor shows universal themes or his “liberating forces”: time and place, emotion and memory, and transition and permanence. His Ether series, for instance, is created out of his explorations on the expressive qualities of muted colors (predominantly gray), line, space, and texture. Critic Cid Reyes wrote in the book on the artist and his works, Immaterial: “Albor retains a disdain for hedonism—in color, in the showy bravura of surface manipulation, in the deliberate grabbing for attention.

Rather, the artist prefers for his art to distance itself from the viewer, so that from a certain physical perspective and illusionistic ambiguity, the artist may lead the viewer into the light and labyrinths of his art. For Albor, the primary of his vision lies in the courtship between material and image, matter and spirit, nature and technology.” This contemplative piece is part of his Ether Series in which he renders horizontal lines and uses muted
colors with an adherence to minimalist sensibilities. Blanketing the pictorial field is a predominance of gray that evokes luminance and invites the viewer to look inward, into a state of sustained meditation.