Joseph Bernadas is a self-taught artist based in California. He was born in the Philippines and moved to the United States in 2006. His works have been exhibited in various galleries in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany and the Philippines.
Artist Statement
My work explores the tension between surface appearances and deeper, often uncomfortable truths. Using oil paint as a medium for inquiry, I build scenes where familiar forms slip into the uncanny—where myth, memory, and critique intertwine. The figures in my paintings inhabit dreamlike landscapes shaped by longing, distortion, and resistance. They are not so much characters as they are vessels—witnesses to forces larger than themselves.
Recurring symbols—a red-cloaked figure, a watchful eye, a ruin in disguise—thread through these spaces, appearing across shifting terrains. In these quiet, surreal dreamscapes, power often wears a mask: a faceless official, a hollow idol, a queen of trash. These images emerge from a world shaped by political decay, institutional amnesia, and spiritual confusion—but they don’t simply illustrate those themes. They evoke them in ways that feel suspended, incomplete, and open to the viewer’s own projections.
I draw influence from surrealism and Renaissance painting, but my concern is contemporary: What happens when sacred symbols lose their meaning? When authority becomes performance? When our inner worlds are shaped by systems that feel inhuman? The distortions in form, space, and proportion are not just stylistic—they are a way of expressing the emotional truth beneath the rational façade.
I am less interested in providing answers than in composing visual riddles—emotional questions suspended in time. Each painting is both mirror and threshold: it reflects back the contradictions we live with, while pointing toward other possible worlds just beyond reach.
Awards
| Prize | Show Title | Year | Venue |
|---|---|---|---|
| First Prize, Works on Canvas | Dimensions XLV | 2017 | Art Center, Corpus Christi, Texas, USA |
| Honorable Mention | American Dream - National Juried Exhibition | 2017 | K Space Contemporary, Corpus Christi, Texas, USA |
| Finalist | Metrobank Young Painters Annual | 1998 | Makati, Philippines |
Selected Exhibitions
| Year | Show Title | Venue |
|---|---|---|
| 2024 | Renascence | Limner Gallery, Hudson, New York, USA |
| 2023 | Portraits | Gallery Omnibus, Dresden, Germany |
| 2022 | The Divine Feminine | Art From Heart CIC, London, United Kingdom |
| 2022 | Deception of the Digital | Geneva Center for the Arts, Geneva, Illinois, USA |
| 2022 | 1st Annual Photography & Digital Art Exhibit | San Francisco Women Artists Gallery, San Francisco, California, USA |
| 2022 | All Art+: Creating Reality | Van Der Plas Gallery, New York, NY, USA |
| 2017 | Dimensions XLV | Art Center, Corpus Christi, Texas, USA |
| 2017 | American Dream - National Juried Exhibition | K Space Contemporary, Corpus Christi, Texas, USA |
| 2016 | The Remembered | K Space Contemporary, Corpus Christi, Texas, USA |
| 2012 | K Space Studio Artists | K Space Studios, Corpus Christi, Texas, USA |
| 2009 | K Space Painters Annual | Corpus Christi, Texas, USA |
| 2007 | Art Center Independents Annual | Corpus Christi, Texas, USA |
| 2006 | NO Art Exhibit | Dumaguete City, Philippines |
| 2005 | Buglasan Festival | Dumaguete City, Philippines |
| 2003 | Kinaiyahan Art Exhibit | Dumaguete City, Philippines |
| 2001 | Drowing-drowing Dos | Ayala Center, Cebu City, Philippines |
| 1998 | Metrobank Young Painters Annual | Makati, Philippines |
| 1997 | Dipolog Art Fest | Dipolog City, Philippines |
| 1996 | Grupong Sosyal | Endhouse, Dumaguete City, Philippines |
| 1995 | Sugod sa Katapusan | Endhouse, Dumaguete City, Philippines |
| 1995 | The Endhouse Artists | Endhouse, Dumaguete City, Philippines |
| 1994 | Samba Likhaan | Quezon City, Philippines |