The fascinating mind and art of Mark Justiniani

By Ted Aldwin Ong

Though brief, my encounter with renowned Filipino contemporary artist Mark Justiniani was rich, substantive, and memorable. It provided critical insight into the conceptual foundations of his artistic practice and deepened my understanding of his art and life, offering valuable lessons for art writing.

I met him as he lingered with the last few guests during the vernissage of Rhapsodies and Recollections—an exhibition featuring his bronze sculpture Ang Debate, presented in an aesthetic dialogue with The Reunion by National Artist for Visual Arts BenCab, at the Iloilo Museum of Contemporary Art.

We shared a brief but engaging exchange on the state of the Iloilo local art scene and its support systems, the role of art and art writing in development, and the growing presence of artificial intelligence in creative fields and daily life. I returned the following day for an afternoon of deeper learning about the artist and his work.

A Negrense with a gentle Hiligaynon accent, Mark Justiniani revealed himself as an inveterate seeker of knowledge—a true polymath—whose intellectual inquiries spanned science, mathematics, philosophy, history, and technology. His practice was deeply informed by an ongoing fascination with the mechanics of the universe: from the laws of gravity and the subatomic world of neutrons and atoms to the vast architectures of the galaxy, the solar system, and the Milky Way.

As he spoke, a projection displayed an array of his works that visually echoed the themes he discussed. His art reflected humanity’s smallness on the cosmic scale, evoking our fragile place in the universe with both wonder and humility. His installations invited viewers to contemplate their position not only within physical space but also within metaphysical and philosophical dimensions.

Justiniani was the kind of artist whose work could lead one to revisit Plato’s Republic, Albert

Einstein’s theory of gravity, or the recursive patterns in Siyi Ye’s Fibonacci Mirror. His immersive Infinity Series shared a conceptual lineage with Stanley Landsman’s Infinity Chambers, while also evoking the immense scale and complexity of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. Yet equally foundational to his artistic vision was a personal memory: lying in bed as a child, gazing into the mirrored headboard of a bookcase—an early encounter with reflection that left a lasting impression and later shaped the development of his sublime installations.

In his work, these diverse disciplines—science, philosophy, and personal memory—converged in meditations on time and space. Perception, temporality, and materiality coalesced into a visual language that explored physical, metaphysical, and existential dimensions.

“The development of a concept wasn’t always rooted in what you’d read or studied,” he reflected. “Not everything was on paper. The concept evolved with the material. You had to hold the material—and the material taught you.”

“You needed to be open and alert—aware that the material was teaching you something,” he continued. “Pareho lang nga daw nagabayle kamo—it’s like dancing with a partner,” he explained in Hiligaynon. “You danced with the material, and as you moved together, you discovered something. It taught you as you guided it. The material shaped the work—it held as much influence as intention.”

In his Void of Spectacles: Reflections on Passages Through Time and History, Mark Justiniani used mirrors not simply as reflective surfaces but as conceptual tools that explored perception, illusion, and reality. Acting as interfaces between the self and the void, these two-dimensional planes created the illusion of infinite depth, extending three-dimensional space into endless visual regressions. The mirror thus became a metaphysical threshold, prompting viewers to question the boundaries between appearance and reality.

This conceptual approach aligned closely with Plato’s theory of Forms, which distinguished the physical world as a mere shadow of a higher, unchanging reality. In his allegory, the material world reflected ideal Forms imperfectly—transient and illusory. Justiniani’s mirrors gave this philosophy a visual dimension, creating the illusion of infinite space that, upon closer inspection, revealed itself as a constructed surface. Like Plato’s cave dwellers mistaking shadows for truth, viewers were momentarily drawn into a false depth—confronting the tension between perception and reality.

Viewed through this lens, Justiniani’s art became philosophical, inviting viewers to question not just what they saw, but what lay beyond appearances. In the endless reflections of his mirrors, the illusion of depth gave way to a deeper inquiry into the divide between surface and substance, the visible world and the realm of Forms.

Mark Orozco Justiniani’s art is a powerful reminder of our place in the cosmos—a humbling confrontation that dissolves the ego and reveals how small we truly are. On the vast scale of the universe, we are but a speck of dust, and his work urges us to see with perspective, humility, and awe.