Terry Acebo Davis

Terry Acebo Davis (born 1953) is a Filipino American artist and nurse based in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her art is thematically linked to her family and her origins as a Filipino American.

Early life and education
Born in Oakland, California, the oldest of six children, Acebo Davis gained a Bachelor of Science in nursing from California State University, Hayward in 1976, followed by graduate coursework in Pediatric Oncology at the University of California, San Francisco. In 1991 she was awarded a Bachelor of Fine Arts by San Jose State University, followed by an MFA in 1993.

Rather than become a full-time artist, Acebo Davis chose to balance making art with work as a professional nurse, serving as a Pediatric Critical Care Transport Specialist at Stanford Medical Center.

Jan Rindfleisch writes, "Acebo Davis has bridged worlds in multiple ways. As a Filipino American growing up in Fremont, she had come with her family often to Japantown to buy rice. As an artist and graduate of SJSU, she chose to live in Palo Alto, a midpoint between the arts centers of San Jose, San Francisco, and Oakland."

Artistic themes and works
Acebo Davis's art is heavily rooted in her origins as a Filipino American, her family, and racial strife and collision. Dahil Sa Yo, her "seminal work", features repetitive images of her mother set behind multiple boxes of shoes, drawing on the public persona of Imelda Marcos. The repetition of the image serves to emphasize the importance of her mother and other women of her generation, who "held together their families and looked after their home" as immigrants.

About her artwork Phoebe Farris writes, "Acebo Davis’ ability to not only manage but lucidly express her complex identity of Filipino American printmaker/mixed-media artist/lecturer/nurse that fuels her highly meditative work. . . Acebo Davis presents to her viewers visual mantras, simultaneously pleasing in their careful compositions yet hauntingly thought-provoking in their subject matter.”

Benjamin Pimentel of the San Francisco Chronicle states “The marks she makes chronicle her many journeys an Asian American woman, a caregiver and an artist.”

Community engagement
Acebo Davis has served as Chairwoman of the Palo Alto Public Art Commission; as a Trustee for Arts Council Silicon Valley; board president and Advisor for WORKS/San Jose.

She is a member of the DIWA Filipino artists' collective, and regularly lectures on the Filipino identity, including lectures at the Smithsonian Institution, the University of Pennsylvania and Mills College.

Awards and distinctions
In 1997 she was awarded the James D. Phelan Award by Kala Art Institute, along with the Radius Award of the Palo Alto Art Center. The same year, she participated in the exhibition Families: Rebuilding, Recreating, Reinventing curated by Flo Oy Wong at the Euphrat Museum of Art.

Acebo Davis received an artist residency at the Frans Masereel Centre in Kasterlee, Belgium in 1998.

In 2003, Acebo Davis was awarded one of the three annual Arts Council Silicon Valley Fellowships.

In 2004 she became the first Filipino American to exhibit art at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco's Samsung Hall, where her piece Tabing Rising, visually describing her family's immigration to the United States in 1945, was displayed in 2004.

Solo exhibitions

 * 2009     Tri-age, Triton Museum, Santa Clara, CA
 * 2007     Gawa sa Belgium, Ayala Foundation, Redwood City, CA
 * 2005     Tracing Ritual, Cabrillo College Gallery, Aptos, CA
 * 2004     Tabing Rising, Asian Art Museum Samsung Hall, San Francisco, CA
 * 2004     Anatomy of Spirit, Stanford University - Institute on Women & Gender, Stanford, CA
 * 2003     Diwata, Babilonia 1808, Berkeley, CA
 * 2001     Nepal and Black, Washington Square Gallery, San Francisco, CA


 * 1998     New Work, Washington Square Gallery, San Francisco, CA
 * 1996     Of the Body, Boom Gallery, Honolulu, HI
 * 1995     Cantho into Haarlem: New Works, Richard Sumner Gallery, Palo Alto, CA
 * 1993     Redefining Self: The Flip Side, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA

Group exhibitions

 * 2023     Resilience, Contra Costa County Hospital  in Martinez, CA
 * 2023     Palo Alto Studios Celebrates 20 years, Palo Alto Studios Gallery, Palo Alto Art Studio Artists Group, Palo Alto, CA
 * 2023     Art in the Garden, Gamble Gardens, Palo Alto, CA
 * 2022     Begin Again, Palo Alto Studios Gallery /Palo Alto Art Studio Artists Group, Palo Alto, CA
 * 2021     An Art Affair, Palo Alto Studios Gallery /Palo Alto Art Studio Artists Group, Palo Alto, CA
 * 2020     COVID Times, Palo Alto Studios Gallery /Palo Alto Art Studio Artists Group, Palo Alto, CA
 * 2015     Constructs, Wing Luke Museum, Seattle WA
 * 2015     Books, Smith Anderson Editions Palo Alto, CA
 * 2014     Anniversary of South Bay Area Artists, Artik San Jose, CA
 * 2012     Gender Specific, Smith Anderson Editions, Palo Alto, CA
 * 2009     Print Retrospective with Artists, Bill Gould Design and Architecture, San Jose, CA
 * 2009     A Space of Her Own  with Asian American Women in Art, De Young Museum's Kimball Gallery San Francisco, CA
 * 2008     Tortilla Curtain Project, Krause Center for Innovation Gallery at Foothill College, Los Altos, CA
 * 2007     From Hedonopolis to Melancolony,  University of San Francisco Thatcher Gallery, San Francisco, CA
 * 2007     Overmapped, SOMA San Francisco, CA
 * 2007     Dealer's Choice, Smith Anderson Editions, Palo Alto, CA
 * 2006     Contemporary Filipino American Artists, Contemporary Museum of Hawaii, Honolulu, HI
 * 2006    181st Invitational of Contemporary Art, National Academy Museum, New York, NY
 * 2006    Out of the Box, Palo Alto Art Center, Palo Alto, CA
 * 2006    Pacific Prints, Pacific Art League, Palo Alto, CA
 * 2003    Triton Museum, Arts Council Silicon Valley Fellowship Awardee Exhibition, Santa Clara, CA
 * 2002    Global Dialogue, Antwerp Center, Antwerp, Belgium
 * 2001    Pinoy / Pinay,  San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery, San Francisco, CA
 * 2000    Bae,  Luggage Store, San Francisco, CA
 * 1999    To Be... ,  WORKS Art and Performance, San Jose, CA
 * 1998    Destiny Manifesting with DIWA Arts Collective, Galeria de La Raza, San Francisco, CA
 * 1998    Sister City Sisters: San Francisco Babaylan, Contemporary Art Installations: Art by eight San Francisco Women Artists,  Museo ng Maynila, Manila Philippines and San Francisco State University Fine Arts Gallery, San Francisco, CA
 * 1998    Re-Orientation, Washington Square Gallery, San Francisco, CA
 * 1998    Prints, Stanford Art Spaces, Stanford University, CA
 * 1998    1898- Critical Points and Balikbayan Box: Tracing a Strain with DIWA Arts, Bronx Museum, NY
 * 1998    Seino Ka? ano Ka? Fine Art Gallery, San Francisco State University, CA
 * 1997    Respect Diversity, Mountain View City Hall, Mountain View, CA
 * 1997    Families: Rebuilding, Reinventing, Recreating, Euphrat Museum, Cupertino, CA
 * 1997    Multicultural Perspectives, Koret Gallery, Palo Alto, CA
 * 1997    Bay Area's Diversity in Art, Synopsis, Inc. Office, Mountain View, CA
 * 1997    Message to the Next Generation, Oakland Asian Cultural Center, Oakland, CA
 * 1996    Art in the Urban Landscape - Bayanihan Transition with DIWA Arts, Capp Street Project, San Francisco, CA
 * 1996    Memories of Overdevelopment: Philippine Diaspora in Contemporary Visual Art with DIWA Arts, University of California at Irvine
 * 1996    Kayumanggi Presence '96, East-West Gallery, University of Hawaii, Honolulu, HI
 * 1995    Biennial Print Competition and Exhibition, Triton Art Museum, Santa Clara, CA
 * 1995    Canto into Haarlem, Richard Sumner, Gallery, Palo Alto, CA
 * 1995   13th Annual National Juried Exhibition, Los Angeles Printmaking Society, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, CA
 * 1995    Filipinas in Hawaii, The Philippine Consulate General, Honolulu, HI
 * 1995    Artists Respond to Proposition 187, San Jose Center for Latino Arts, San Jose, CA
 * 1995    Black and White, Lucy Berman Gallery, Palo Alto, CA
 * 1995   The Dresden Exchange, Institute of Contemporary Art, San Jose, CA; Bay Area Artists, Dresden, Germany
 * 1994   Yellow Forest, SOMAR Gallery, San Francisco, CA
 * 1994   Making Women Artists Visible, Galería Tonantzin, San Juan Bautista, CA
 * 1994   Bay Area Artists, Galerie Adlergasse, Dresden, Germany
 * 1994   Día de Los Muertos, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, CA
 * 1994   Summer Artists Residency Exhibition,  Reese Bullen Gallery at Humboldt State University Arcata, CA
 * 1993   Works on Paper, Berkeley Art Center, Berkeley. CA
 * 1993   Object as Identity, 1078 Gallery, Chico, CA
 * 1993   Printmakers, Walter Bischoff Gallery-Amerikahaus, Stuttgart, Germany
 * 1993   American Exhibition, Stuttgart International Airport, Stuttgart, Germany
 * 1993   Kayumanggi Presence, Academy Art Center at Linekona, Honolulu, HI
 * 1993   Time Echoes, C. N. Norman Gallery, University of California, Davis, CA
 * 1992   San Jose State University Art Faculty,  Simon and Schuster Publishers, Santa Clara, CA
 * 1992   The Fourth Floor, Market Street Alternative Space, San Jose, CA
 * 1992   Harmony of Cultures, Bingham Gallery, San Jose, CA
 * 1991   New Printmakers Invitational, California State University, Long Beach, CA