Jon Cuyson is a Filipino artist and filmmaker whose interdisciplinary practice spans painting, sculpture, installation, artist books, and moving images. His work explores maritime histories, labor, migration, queer ecologies, and memory through immersive environments where abstraction, materiality, and narrative converge.
Born in Manila, where he lives and works, Cuyson approaches the sea as a site where personal and collective histories continually accumulate, drift, and transform. Central to his practice is Mussel Thinking, an artistic framework inspired by the ecological behaviors of mussels through filtering, clustering, and sedimentation. A recurring figure in his work is Kerel, a fictional queer Filipino seafarer who moves across films and installations, reimagining oceanic histories through speculative forms of storytelling.
In 2026, Cuyson represented the Philippines at the 61st Venice Biennale with Sea of Love / Dagat ng Pag-ibig, an immersive installation bringing together painting, sculpture, sound, and moving image. His work has been exhibited internationally across Asia, Europe, and the United States. Following the Biennale, he was invited to undertake a residency at Port Tonic Art Center in Saint-Tropez, where he continued developing Sea of Love through a new body of paintings and sculptural works shaped by the material and maritime histories of the Mediterranean.