Filipino Artists (in no particular order) Part 7

Art is one of those things that propel the human race forward. We create it as we trudge the path of enlightenment. We appreciate it and we absorb it, as we slowly evolve into the superhuman.

from "Forty Six and Two" by Tool


"See my shadow changing,
Stretching up and over me
Soften this old armor
Hoping I can clear the way
By stepping through my shadow,
Coming out the other side
Step into the shadow
Forty six and two are just ahead of me "


thoughts on the above song by OBERONES:

"Basically, it's believed that there are three levels of human evolution and each has it's form of conciousness. There's the 1st level with 44 chromosones. These are primitve people's like the aboriginies in Australia who do not percieve anything outside of themselves. They only see one large conciousness with no distinguishment between organisms. Then there's the second level with 46 chromosones. That is us. We are a chaotic disharmonic conciousness that is basically used as a stepping stone between the first and third levels. The third level is 48 chromosones. (Or 46 & 2, with 2 being the sex chromosones x & y). This is the higher level of conciousness. Our destination.

But this is where the Jungian theory comes in. It is believed that you can not reach this third level of evolution without first delving into yourself and basically cleansing your conciousness for the next jump. That's where the Shadow comes in. The shadow is basically everything about that is unseen that you are uncomfortable with or hate. This is also known as the Anima."

Art helps us identify, express and isolate our Anima.

Wow metaphysical na..

At dahil diyan, tuloy ang blog...

61. Jigger Cruz credit: Tala gallery

62. Rey Aurelio credit: ArtePinas

63. Impy Pilapil- As eighties as Patrick Nagel.. and I mean that in the most admiring and reverent way. I am a fan of both artists.   credit: Artist's own site

64. Rodel Tapaya- Here's an artist whose work I really enjoy. Well-thought-of characters, strange awkward beasts, dark forests made of human trees.. Great stuff. wait..  (credit: Christie's auctions)

64. Rodel Tapaya- Two images for one Artist. I wanted to show the transition that his style went through. The series "Memory Landscapes" features white luminous diaphanous draped figures that are not specters to be feared but actually (If i understand correctly) just familiar characters in the artist's memory.  credit: ManilaArtblogger

65. Don Salubayba- I like chaos and the harmony that follows it like beautiful white seagulls following a barge of trash as it's pulled downstream. credit: KulayDiwa

66. Jeff Dizon- Here's another artist who underwent a big transition.. Early Jeff Dizon work seems to represent more common barrio scene stuff, with his present style only very slightly showing in the subjects' faces. Now, his characters have taken on a pallid look, with aeon flux digits and an almost manga-like composition. What's more, if you look at his works for sale in the ArtCircle website.. He seems to be flourishing, with a lot of his similarly themed.. actually, almost identical paintings up for sale. Good move, business-wise. credit: Artcircle

67. Oscar Zalameda- Widely emulated, nationally copied. The Philippine Star published a very informative article (click here) when he died. Seems from simple roots, he developed a taste for high society, even adopting their postures and inflections as his own. We can guess how that cinderello story ends, as it does most of the time.. Now his works reach record auction values. Read the article.. there's a lesson i think. credit: Philstar

68. Wire Tuazon- Juxtaposed      Superimposed. credit: Christie's Auctions

69. Julio Austria- credit: Tala Gallery

70. Emmanuel Servito- Simple and humorous. I find the lines harsh and hard to stare at.. so seeing his work on burlap was a treat. credit: KristelMartin gallery

Moar to come.

Filipino Artists (in no particular order) Part 6

I've been sketching lately, mostly studies for larger scale work when I find the time (yeah right.) and I notice some changes in my style. Do our styles of expression:

• naturally change as we mature and age?
• change because of what we experience?
• change because of changes in the way we perceive things?
• change because of changing influences?

And because i said the word "change" so many times, I present you with Lyrics from David Bowie..

"
I watch the ripples change their size
But never leave the stream
Of warm impermanence
So the days float through my eyes
But stil the days seem the same
And these children that you spit on
As they try to change their worlds
Are immune to your consultations
They’re quite aware of what they’re going through"

On with the Artists.

51. Kiko Escora- Trivia: if you search google images for "Kiko Escora" you get more pictures of the artist than his art. credit: Worldseriesattitude

52. Antipas Delotavo- A true master of capturing human emotion and sometimes the absence of it. credit: bjanepr files

53. Napoleon Abueva

54. Leslie de Chavez- Great non-cheesy socio-political commentary and they all look like Zombie Andres Bonifacios. credit: ArteFilipinas

55. Mideo Cruz- There's more to this dude than controversial Phalluses.. He's a pretty good painter and an immensely talented and creative performance artist. credit: manilaartblogger

56. Banji Bisaya- From 20 meters away or so, youd look at his works and be like, Yep, it's wood.., But move closer and you'll see the craftsmanship and masterful carpentry this guy possesses. Everything is perfectly "squalado" and the parts that are meant to move, do so precisely. Made from odds and ends the artist gathers on long journeys northward, the works have a sense of perfection about them. Galing! credit: Jillaine Lanuza's Tumblr

57. Federico Sievert- The artist hails from USTe, like my wife, who is a work of art :) credit: KulayDiwa

58. Abdulmari Imao- One of our National Artists, Dr. Imao depicts his happy, smiling sarimanok in vivid hues on canvas, as well as in bronze. credit: postcolonial.web

59. Jun Caingat credit: eccagallery

60. Nick Pongan- I loved staring at his Tuna Workers paintings at the Megamall. Not acquiring one from that series is one of my biggest regrets, and I hardly regret. Bwiset. credit: Satoshikyo's Picasa

Moar to come..

Filipino Artists (in no particular order) Part Voltes V

I met Manuel Ocampo and Romeo Lee the other day at d.a.g.c.. Cool guys.. No "art-snob" airs whatsoever. Romeo even made me take a picture of his mural for posterity. Earlier that day, I dropped by the CCP main gallery to check out the "Kulo" exhibit. Lots of nice work there, The big lola, the flaming guy, the guy sleeping with his dick hanging out, the pale guy, and more. You can see the post on my facebook. It was around ten in the morning so there weren't many people and it was great. the substitute curator for saturdays, Ate Supladita, wasn't very happy about me taking blog photos. She wasn't any help too, when i asked about what the CCP had planned to stop the vandalism (the poor Lindslee painting!). In fact, she wasn't any help at all. And when some high school students arrived and asked her about Mideo Cruz's installation, she brushed them aside with her proud ignorance. I felt I had to step in and the kids were eager listeners anyway. I explained what polytheism is, and told the kids to look at the installation and see if they could spot how polytheism was represented there. They also asked about the mickey mouse ears and clown nose on the poon, I asked them in return.. "what could mickey mouse symbolize that could be related to religious images?" Some said "TV" some said "Disneyland" and many agreed with the one who said "USA". Also they asked me if the hand was real and I said maybe it's silicon latex. (I hope..) Anyway, here we go..

41. Julie Lluch - She made a bust of my mom. No, it's not this one. Credit: Ateneo Gallery

42. Galo Ocampo- really epic looking scenes.. reminds me of that american painter who did storms, volcanoes, canyons etc. but i forgot his name.. i know his work was similar to Tavernier..  credit: Arcadja

43. Max Balatbat- the first painting I ever bought for the house was by Max.. The story: I've seen the paintings before, without knowing the Artist's name. It's like a visual version of LSS (last song syndrome). Lucky me, I chanced upon his solo exhibit in Megamall. Imagine this, big and small Max Balatbat paintings on exhibit, with installations of ladies underwear and "used" condoms supported by piped in "Romansa" music by James Ingram and other seksi singers. I realized the genius of this man there and I made it a point to have a piece for my house. Noli from Renaissance gallery didn't know the title, so I took a chance and wrote Max on Facebook to ask. What a champ, this guy.. he drafted a certificate of authenticity for my painting, and noted the title "Ilaya".. One of my favorite streets in Divisoria. End of story. Max continues to evolve, and happily, his work is well documented online, so you can really see how his style came to be and maybe where it's going. I can't wait for the next solo exhibit. Astig. .credit: Manilart

44. Mariano Ching- Beautiful, absurd. credit: presidents.tumblr

45. Gabby Barredo- This shoulda been an animated GIF, since most of his work is motorized to give a kinetic clockwork effect. credit: KulayDiwa

46. Poklong Anading- From Finale Art Gallery: "During the opening of Poklong Anading's "Light suffers if there is no place to fall from" at the Finale Art Gallery, the audience was confronted with an empty space save for a ribbon of neon light shaped like a mouse trap. While the viewers were crowding around the rather curious object, the artist surreptitiously took a photograph of them, their backs turned to the camera. All anonymous but bound by the same eagerness to make sense of the occurrence, the viewers didn't know days later that they, themselves, would be the subjects of a work in the exhibit they attended: a lifesize photograph that forever captures their gesture of looking inward." BIGAAAAT! credit: Finale

47. Charlie Co credit: clickthecity

48. Jose Tence Ruiz- Another of my favorite Artists.. This multimedia genius is a master at detail, structure and form, both in 2d and 3d. You've probably driven past his work, the large-scale "Ganap" on EDSA. The creatures seem very Haeckel-Influenced (see my background) and I love that..  Check out his gothic sorbetero and his Sagrada Familia-looking Oil Rig thing.. Genius. credit: AngelFloresJr.

49. Lydia Velasco- Another artist with a very interesting evolution in her work. Compared to the women in her earlier paintings, the most recent works feature women with even more slender, almost serpentine features. Mother dear gave me one from the nineties, I hope to acquire a current one to hang beside it.  credit: Artsentralasia

50. Nune Alvarado- Stone faced workers both men and women with arms like tree trunks, thick and veiny, probably from toiling in the fields. Unique and easy to spot among other works. credit: Metrogallery

Watch out for more!!

JH

Filipino Artists (in no particular order except who I remember first) Part IV

Wow, pare, art.
You know how sometimes, people look at a Picasso and say, "THAT is worth 20 million? I could paint that myself!!" you know what the answer to that is? Yes, you could have painted it, but you didn't, Picasso did. And anything after that would be just a forgery, a tribute, a mimicry, a tired aping of an original. You can see that in mass-produced abstract "art". Some people, when not thinking right, love "parang" works.. PARANG Zalameda fishermen scene.. PARANG Basquiat.. PARANG Pollock..
Sometimes an artist's influences show in his/her work. That's different..and on we go with my blog.

31. Ang Kiukok- Fighting dogs, angry fish, a wild cockfight, a couple doin' it.. I've loved his paintings since I could see colors.. The dead gaze of the eyes, the exaggerated gesticulations and the dynamism and violence were to me as entertaining as any Saturday morning cartoon.

32. Dex Fernandez- The paintings look like the work of Low-attention span cyborgs armed with Caffeine and paintbrushes. Lots of social undertones in his work, poking a sometimes derisive finger at politics, religion, and everything else that makes the world look less like a Dex Fernandez painting. credit: VisualHag

33. Froilan Calayag- One of my favorite contemporary Pinoy artists! I don't own any of Froilan's works but hopefully my wife will get the hints i keep dropping. How do I describe these cool pieces? You know how in your dreams, there are fantastic, unbelievable animals and scary creatures, but your mind somehow registers them as real? I mean, like you're walking in a forest of giant onions, and you see a Cyclops.. you don't scream or run, you just go like "Oh, a cyclops." That's what it's like to live in his paintings i guess.. He has a talent for making the unbelievable denizens of his domain real and believable and even welcoming.. :) I chose this one because it gives a nod and a wink to my childhood hero, Nonoy Marcelo's Ikabod. credit: Artist's own blog

34. Mark Andy Garcia- Birthing form from chaos.. a LOT of chaos.. credit: Philvisualarts

35. Camille de la Rosa- Imagine Giuseppe Arcimboldo running out of ingredients to use.. He goes insane and butchers his models to use their body parts. credit: visionarygallery

36. Jose Joya- known as the Goya of the Philippines because he is also an artist and his name is a Homonym. credit: askart

37. Ramon Orlina- If mammary serves me right, Only a boob would not keep abreast of the national artist's work. If you disagree, well, then tit for tat.  credit: the artist's own blog

38. Juvenal Sanso- We know him for his alien landscape looking paintings that look like Led Zeppelin's Houses of the Holy album cover.. But he also did human subjects. Credit: Manilaartblogger

39. Francisco Viri- The thing about having a distinct style or signature is that when you get recognition, less creative people want to cash in on your wave and copy your style.. but it ends up looking baduy, or ends up in the Frames section of SM department store. But then again, it's all subject to personal preference. Credit: KulayDiwa

40. Jose Legaspi- An artist i really admire, not because I'm a dark brooding kinda guy (those who know me could tell you I'm a fountain of joy), but because I've seen the brutality that Jojo captures on canvas running amuck in the streets, in our homes, in our schools, on TV and in the government houses. I may not have experienced most of it, thank God, but i know that pain looks like Jojo's St Thelma. My favorite works: Phlegm (the collection of drawings of people jumping off cliffs, stabbing their children, having painful sex, killing their pets, and other arresting imagery.) I also love his almost photorealistic work of people with er, issues? A man stabbing himself IN THE MOUTH.. A couple that looks ready to dismember each other, a man in pain AND in drag... All manifestations of suffering, exploitation, treachery, gender dysmorphia, hatred and loneliness. Macabre and gloomy is too weak.. I prefer the term art critics use: "Really f*cked up"  credit: ManilaArtBlogger

Watch this blog for the next installment!!!