EDGAR "GARY" CARABIO, PSA, IAPSMC
Carabio is a Florida-based artist who is originally from Bantayan Island in Cebu, Philippines. He grew up in a family of skilled artists and craftsmen. As a youngster in his hometown, he showed an innate skill and early promise which proved true in 1978 when at the tender age of 11, he won his first prize in an on-the-spot painting contest held in Cebu City.
A self-taught artist who looked up to his great grandfather who was a painter and a sculptor, he took up Fine Arts at the University of the Philippines where he made record winnings at the annual Jose T. Joya Awards. Winning consistently for three years, he garnered a total of five first place awards in the representational, figurative, and non-objective abstraction categories. While in college, he staged his first solo show which was in 1991 and titled “Bantayan” at the Casa Gorordo Museum in Cebu. The exhibit was a tribute to his hometown. Following this, he went through multiple successful art exhibits throughout the Philippines and internationally. He has also given workshops and art lessons and was an active member of the group BINHI (seed), a Christian group of artists who supports by sharing portions of their exhibit proceeds to missions.
Carabio has the gift and mastery of painting in a most realistic manner, these works connotes a reality of forms, colors, and perspective. His art evokes a feeling of restraint and melancholy but offers his viewers a sense of belongingness to subjects that are always close to his heart. Most of his subjects are reminiscent of his childhood living in Bantayan. He finds fascination in painting people depicting everyday life and portraiture.
He is also at peace with any medium, be it oil, watercolor, acrylic, or pastel. For him, nurturing one’s creativity should not be limited to one medium of choice but to freely be able to express in whichever with as much authenticity. He believes it is also a way to enjoy painting.
Having moved to St. Paul, Minnesota in 2012, he has involved himself in multiple juried art exhibits and art festivals in the twin cities and other states in the U.S. He has accumulated multiple awards from different juried shows he participated in. Some of these awards included the Gold Award which he won at the 30th International Association of Pastel Societies Convention in New Mexico in 2017, the Jack Richeson & Co. Gold Award at the Annual Pastel Society of America exhibition in New York which was also in 2017, and a First Place award in the 2018 UArt International Web Show. He also won Third Award in the Third China (Suzhou) International Biennial Exhibition in Suzhou, Jiangsu, China. He was a member of the Minnesota Artists Association and Lake Country Pastel Society before moving to Tampa, Florida. His most recent participation in exhibits included the National Arts Club in New York, the Butler Institute of American Arts in Youngstown, Ohio and the IAPS Convention in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Carabio is currently a Signature Member of the Pastel Society of Tampa Bay, Pastel Society of America and is in the Masters Circle in the International Association of Pastel Societies. Highly endowed with the gift of creativity and the cultural life of the Philippines, his paintings today are still reflective of the genre, even as he is now based in the urban landscape of the city where he and his family lives.
He is currently preparing for his 3rd one-man show in the U.S. to be held in Dunedin, Florida on December 2020.
