Are actual, physical objects the sole constituents of presence? Nilo Ilarde investigates such ponderings and examines the relations between objects and empty spaces.Ilarde engages in a precise, meticulous and almost clinical displacement of art objects and spaces. Ilarde also constitutes presence through the juxtaposition of positive and negative spaces.

Ilarde’s concern with such dialectical processes may be traced to his previous exhibitions last decade. Back in 1997, Ilarde’s solo show entitled “A Thing in Itself” featured an installation comprised of thousands of pencils displayed on the walls of the Lopez Museum – a transposition of values, so to speak, where the seemingly mundane nature of the materials used in artistic production is imbued with a sublimity and “aura” traditionally ascribed to priveleged works of art. Ilarde continued to experiment with such metaphors in his solo exhibition last 2001 at the Cultural Center of the Philippines Small Gallery entitled “The White Cube”. Here, Ilarde stripped the gallery walls of the layers of paint and grime acquired during approximately three decades of exhibitions, displaying the entire strata of paint stripped off in the process of excavating and wounding in a white cube. A conceptual artist and curator, Ilarde also served as the Exhibition Director of Pinaglabanan Galleries from 1984-1985.