Kiko Escora is a Filipino contemporary artist whose nuanced depiction of forms always result in virtuosic, innovative, and unforgettable images. Escora, who also goes by the moniker Manila Animal, creates phantasmagorical-esque figures that play on the vulnerability of emotions and the body with hints of unlocking the danger of freeing a hedonistic act.

Whether it’s death or life, love or lust, delirium or boredom, Escora’s work emphasizes movement or stillness, color, drama, and sensuality, luring his viewers into the paradox of resolving a mental act into visual elements. What’s remained constant from Escora’s early paintings onwards is the use of transgressive images of identity, intimacy, theism, and mortality. He deftly creates his work through the use of charcoal and acrylic.

Kiko Escora was awarded the CCP’s 13 Artists Award in 2003. He has had numerous solo and group exhibitions in the Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Spain, Thailand, Dubai, Miami, New York, and Beijing.