IJWBAA [eej-wah] is a Filipino digital artist and the first Filipino recognized in Techspressionism. He is a neologist and the originator of Decolonial Minimalism —an art movement that reclaims minimalism through ancestral memory and cultural reawakening. His work earned a spot on the shortlist for the Hiiibrand Design and Illustration Awards 2024. His papers were published on Academia.edu.He was selected by David Quiles Guilló, Director of The Wrong, to participate in the 7th Edition of The Wrong Biennale - described by The New York Times as the digital world's answer to Venice Biennale - with Prayers to Ai, further cementing his standing in the international digital art community. His collected works, compiled in two volumes of I Just Wannabe an Artist, have been recognized, officially archived, cataloged, and made available in the collections of the Gallerie degli Uffizi, Museo Reina Sofía, the National Museum of the Philippines, Getty Research Institute, and other prominent cultural institutions worldwide. The two volumes are cataloged in WorldCat under OCLC Numbers 1530632939(Book 1) and 1530636063(Book 2).

Pintado and Pintada

Pintado and Pintada

Decolonial Minimalism Founding Work - Culture (Symbols)

Size: 1400 x 1400 pixels

Medium: Digital Art

Artist: IJWBAA

Year: 2025

Description:

Pintado and Pintada by IJWBAA renders ancestral embodiment as chromatic symmetry. Against a muted gray field, two stylized figures stand like mnemonic sentinels—each composed of concentric circles, diamond grids, and zigzag rhythms. These are not mere ornaments; they are visual invocations of the pintado tradition, where tattooed Visayan warriors and women bore marks of courage, lineage, and cosmic alignment. The figures pulse with geometric breath, echoing the sacred choreography of skin and story.

Historically, pintado referred to Visayan men whose bodies were covered in tattoos earned through valor and ritual, while pintada evokes the feminine counterpart—women adorned with ink as symbols of beauty, status, and spiritual resonance. IJWBAA’s abstraction resists ethnographic literalism and instead channels the emotional logic of the tattoo: repetition, symmetry, and layered meaning. The eye-like motifs suggest watchfulness and protection, while the vertical stems anchor the figures like bamboo spines—upright, rooted, resilient.

This artwork reframes tattooing as mnemonic infrastructure. Pintado and Pintada become visual prayers for embodied legacy, where pattern is not decoration but declaration. IJWBAA invites viewers to see the body as archive, the mark as movement, and the ink as inheritance. The piece honors the sacredness of being seen, of being marked, of carrying history on skin. It is not just a design—it is a duet of dignity.

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