The Founding 100
The 100 Artists Who Built Obramaestra
The first 100 artists selected to help build the definitive home for Filipino art.
They came from different places, disciplines, backgrounds, and generations. But they share one thing: they chose to be part of what comes next.
These are the artists helping us make Filipino art more discoverable, more collectible, and more celebrated — one artwork, one story, and one collector at a time.
What it means
What does “Founding Artist” mean?
Obramaestra is building more than an online marketplace. We're building a community around Filipino art — a place where collectors can discover the artists behind it.
The Founding 100 are the first artists we're inviting to help build that community. As a Founding Artist, you're not simply adding your work to another marketplace — you're helping shape what Obramaestra becomes.
One day, we hope the Founding 100 will be remembered as the artists who helped put Filipino art on the map.
Meet the Founding 100
100 artists. One movement.
An evolving story of Filipino art — explore the artists helping us build what comes next.
Why we chose them
Why these 100?
We didn't choose the Founding 100 simply because they had the largest following. We chose artists whose work, stories, perspectives, and ambitions contribute to the richness of Filipino art.
Some are already known. Some are just beginning to be discovered. Some have been creating for decades. Others are just finding their voice.
The point isn't where they are today. It's where Filipino art is going next.
Think your work belongs here?
Our mission
Filipino art deserves to be discovered.
Extraordinary Filipino artists are creating work across the country — and around the world. But discovery is still fragmented. Artists share their work across social feeds. Collectors search from page to page. Great stories disappear into algorithms.
We believe there should be a place built specifically for Filipino art. A place where artists can be discovered. Where collectors can find their next piece. Where emerging voices can be celebrated. And where Filipino art can become part of everyday life.
That's what we're building with Obramaestra. And these 100 artists are helping us build it.
Every artist has a story
An artwork tells you what. A story tells you why.
That's why we document the people behind the work — not just the work itself.
Founding Artist #010
3 years away, then every version of himself
Carlito Vidal Jr.
Painting, mixed media · Kidapawan City, North Cotabato
Carlito Tagunayon Vidal Jr. is from Kidapawan City, North Cotabato, and has loved art since his student days, trying landscapes, portraits, caricatures and abstract work for the fun of it. In 2019 he left his job as a DepEd teacher and moved to Bangkok, where he stopped making art for three years, his pieces scattered and his own style not yet found.
Read their story
Founding Artist #005
The boy who never stopped drawing
Felix Catarata
Painting · Bogo City, Cebu
Felix Catarata was drawing long before he ever picked up a brush. Growing up in Bogo City, Cebu, he used whatever was around him: his father’s carpentry pencil, charcoal pulled from the kitchen, sticks dragged through wet ground. He drew on walls, on scratch paper, on banana leaves, and shaped small figures out of termite clay, usually of his siblings, relatives, or whoever else was around to sit still long enough.
Read their story
Founding Artist #001
The seafarer who found his canvas
Jorge Fuedan Jr.
Mixed Media · Caloocan City, NCR
Jorge Fuedan Jr. is a mixed-media artist from the Bicol Region (currently based in Caloocan City) whose journey into art began unexpectedly. During the COVID-19 pandemic, while quarantining in a hotel for over a week before joining his ship, boredom led him to pick up a brush and pencil — resulting in his first seascape painting. What started as a way to pass the time soon became a lifelong pursuit.
Read their story