With a distinctive art style that probes at the veil between myth and reality, Western Sydney-based Filipina-Australian artist Marikit Santiago’s paintings are a love letter to her family and her culture. It’s not hard to see why Santiago has been named the winner of the 2024 La Prairie Art Award, and you can see her impressive work for yourself now at the Art Gallery of New South Wales.
Now in its third year, the prestigious La Prairie Art Award is all about championing Australian women artists. A partnership between the Art Gallery of NSW and Swiss luxury skincare house La Prairie, the prestigious award comprises the acquisition of artwork for the Art Gallery collection, as well as an international artist residency in Europe.
Santiago was selected for her two paintings ‘A Seat at the Table (Magulang)’ and ‘A Seat at the Table (Kapatid)’. These tender portraits portray two generations of Santiago’s family – her parents and her sister – with magulang translating to ‘parents’ and kapatid to ‘sibling’ in Tagalog. These award-winning paintings are on display as part of the Making Worlds exhibition on lower level 1 of the Art Gallery’s newer North Building (the star of the Sydney Modern expansion) until late July. (Hot tip: entry is free, and the gallery is open late on Wednesdays.)
Encompassing new acquisitions and much-loved collection highlights, the Making Worlds exhibition brings together artists whose work reflects on the complex worlds we create and share, both real and imagined. This theme is the perfect fit for Marikit’s imaginative and highly personal work. ‘A Seat at the Table (Magulang)’ depicts the artist’s nanay (mother) and tatay (father) at one end of a table laid with lechon (roast pig), banana leaf and a bird of paradise flower. ‘A Seat at the Table (Kapatid)’ is an inverted portrait of Santiago seated next to her sister at a table laid with narcissus daisies and a python snake, a symbol of temptation and sin.
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The works also feature marks made by Santiago’s three young children, who are credited as artistic collaborators in much of her work. Look closer and you’ll also notice that the artist doesn’t paint on canvas, but repurposed cardboard boxes (which began as a practical and accessible way for her to paint in her home and then fold up her projects and get them out of the way).
Art Gallery senior curator of contemporary Australian art, Beatrice Gralton said: “Using oil paint and gold leaf alongside humble materials such as cardboard boxes and markers, Marikit produces rich and detailed compositions, layered with cultural and religious symbolism. Her deeply personal and meticulous practice explores her lived Filipina-Australian experience through the canon of Western art history.”
In response to the Award news, Santiago said: “The La Prairie Art Award is a tangible reward for my parents whose sacrifice and hardship in migrating to Australia provided opportunity and the privileges of my upbringing, which, I firmly believe, allowed me to pursue a career in art while raising a family.”
Santiago is a three-time Archibald Prize finalist (2016, 2021, 2023) and the winner of the 2020 Sir John Sulman Prize at the Art Gallery of NSW, for a painting of her three children. As part of the prize, the artist will travel to Switzerland in June to attend the Art Basel International Art Fair 2024 as a guest of La Prairie.
Marikit Santiago’s paintings are showing in the Making Worlds exhibition on lower level 1 of the Art Gallery of NSW’s North Building until July 28, 2024. Visitors enter the gallery through Ugo Rondinone’s colourful immersive mirror installation, ‘clockwork for oracles 2010’. Entry is free.
