Gil Batle
b. 1962

A Filipino born and raised in the United States, he was in and out of ve di erent prisons in California for 20 years and this is where his self-taught skills in art took shape and developed. The art of tattoo and drawing provided him shield and protection from the violent gangs inside prisons, and his art abound with narratives and symbolisms associated with prison life. 

In his recent solo show, Hatched in Prison: The Art of Gil Batle at the Ricco Maresca Gallery, New York (2015), carefully carved ostrich eggs narrate life inside the prison and feature images such as handcu s, razors, chain-linked fencing, barbed wires, and birds in ight as an allusion to freedom. After years of incarceration, he now lives and works in an island in the Philippines.