Don Maralit Salubayba graduated at the Philippine High School for the Arts and received his Bachelor’s Degree in Fine Arts from the University of the Philippines in 2000. A Cultural Center of the Philippines 13 artist awardee for 2009.
Although he began his career focusing on painting and drawing, his interest quickly shifted to working with light and shadow when he became a key participant and teacher of Anino Shadowplay Collective (www.anino.sining.net). When he returned to painting, he found himself immediately drawn to the struggle between light and dark, experimenting with translucence by laminating his sketches and mixing digital animation and actual puppetry. He has exhibited his works at various galleries and museums here and abroad such as the Drawing Room Gallery, Magnet Gallery, Ayala Museum, Boston Gallery, Kulay Diwa Art Galleries, Anita Gallery at the Center for the Arts in San Antonio, Zambales , Cultural Center of the Philippines, Metropolitan Museum of Manila, Valentine Willie Fine Arts, in Malaysia and Singapore, Fukuoka Asian Art Museum. Japan, DUMBO Art Center and Goliath Visual Space both in New York City. He has participated in the First International Shadow Theatre Festival held in Greece in 2000 and at the Multi media festival entitled “The F.O.B. Show” held at the Binddlestiff (www.binddlestiff.org) in San Francisco, California (2005)
Don also received an Asian Cultural Council grant to participate in a residency program at the Headlands Center for the Arts in Sausalito, California, and at the International Studio and Curatorial Program (ISCP) in New York City in 2004-2005.He won Special Jury Prize Award and Voice Award at the Singapore Short Film Festival held at the Substation Art Center in Singapore for his animation piece, “A Not So Giant Story” in 2006. (www.substation.org)
On 12 March 2014, Salubayba passed away from a burst aneurysm that led to a stroke and coma at age 35.