Joey Cobcobo: I’m Doing my Father’s Business

Artist Joey Cobcobo (b.1983) adapts the Bible verse,Luke 2:49 as the title of his latest works.  The show, “I’m Doing my Father’s Business” is a collaborative work by the artist and his four-year-old son who at a very young age has been encouraged to express himself through the visual medium.  The artist have been gathering and collecting his young son’s drawings and doodles which has become the inspiration for his new works utilizing the printmaking technique of intaglio. 

An active member of the Printmakers Association of the Philippines (PAP), Cobcobo has created a collection of works that not only showcase his son’s early signs of artistic talent but also the artist’s printmaking abilities. 

Initially the artist traces his son’s childlike lines and forms using carbon paper and transfers these on to red bricks.  The image is then incised into the brick surface and applied with ink.  The incised lines that hold the ink is then pressed on to paper.  The result of Cocobo’s project recalls primitive cave drawings that feature human and animal forms, some containing random alphabet letters.  The works, all monoprints are done on rough handmade paper, while others are hand colored expressing the stark contrast either between the dark ink and the reddened paper, or the black ground that highlight the thin colored lines.

Cocobo, is a recognized young figure in Philippine art with a Cultural Center of the Philippines Thirteen Artists awardee in 2012 and in 2010, aJuror’s Choice of Excellency in the Philippine Art Awards, with a series of shortlist nominations  for the Ateneo Art Awards.  A holder of  a bachelor in Fine arts degree (Cum Laude) major in advertising from Technological Unversity of the Philippines, Cobcobohas had numerous exhibitions here and abroad such as New York, Seoul Korea, Singapore, Australia and Vietnam.