For almost a decade and a half now, Alfredo Juan and Isabel Aquilizan have been traversing the globe, unfolding the stories of
Alfredo and Isabel Aquilizan, "Wings (2009)
their life together through their artistic collaborations. Continue reading
Costantino Zicarelli, "1:11:00 (after the birds)"
Cos Zicarelli veers to the dark side. Literally. In this show, we are the kids that your parents warned you about, which opened a few days ago at Art Informal, he makes liberal use of the color black for his paintings on canvas, works in ink on paper, and for the installation that serves as his show’s most commanding piece. Continue reading
To what do we owe the surfeit of exciting shows that opened all over the metro this week? It seems the ides of March has swept in
Patricia Eustaquio, "Dear Sweet Filthy World IV"
the muses, with the Silverlens group leading the way:
Cargo and Decoy installation view
I had never heard of cargo cults in the South Pacific islands before I came to view Cargo and Decoy, Roberto Chabet‘s ongoing show at MO Space. What a fascinating notion, the idea of an actual religion that believes in obtaining blessings through creating crude facsimiles of objects or situations that they long for. Sounds like something you’d only read about from Tintin’s adventures. You can’t help but agree with Mr. Chabet when he likens the artistic process to a cargo cult’s ritual of constructing decoys based on real life. In the end, does the decoy become just as real as the original?
Rodel Tapaya and Marina Cruz introduce their paintings to a new audience through a joint exhibit that opened last week in
Rodel Tapaya, "Top Secret"
Jakarta. Looking Back allows both of them to continue exploring their different takes on the concept of memories. Rodel looks back at folk tales that have been passed down through oral tradition. He once again immortalizes them through his painted narratives. His fantastic characters and wonderful colors bring these stories to life, beautifully compressed in one frame. Continue reading
Cesar Legaspi, "Bar Girls", 1947
Victorio Edades, "Self Portrait", 1928
A year ago, Paulino and Hetty Que allowed Manila art lovers to revel in their wonderful collection of Philippine contemporary
Ang Kiukok, "Girl With Doll"
paintings. We all had our fill of the key Filipino artists making waves today in both the local and international art scene. Continue reading
Leeroy New, detail, "Plane of Celestial Delights"
It’s been fascinating to follow Leeroy New’s creative process. The core of his art stays consistent. He explores the tenets of Filipino Catholicism and Philippine history and integrates these with his inclination for science fiction. Continue reading
Janet Balbarona, "Ricochet 2"
To spark the inspiration that took the Man of La Mancha on his impossible quest, Manuel de Cervantes reportedly wrote while sitting immersed up to his knees in pails of freezing water. He believed that the cold stimulated his literary juices. Artist Janet Balbarona can definitely relate to such unorthodox creativity boosters. She herself has not been averse to donning a ball gown or two while completing her paintings. To prepare for her second solo exhibit, she has taken up residence at the artist’s studio of Blanc Compound in Mandaluyong. Two suitcases crammed with outfits and accessories, plus a horde of shoes, fill her bedroom.
Janet Balbarona, "Dear"
“Kailangan ma- feed ko ang fashion fix when I paint,” the 27-year-old Janet reveals, laughing. Tonight she wears a bright orange, a-line tube, her black bra straps exposed on otherwise bare shoulders, neon yellow sneakers on her feet. A patch of scalp lies visible beneath the close shave of her asymmetric haircut. “I love Vivienne Westwood and anything from the eighties,” she shares. But she goes by what feels right as she works. “Sometimes as I paint a particular detail, feel ko dapat naka red ako. So, palit ako in the middle of painting that object. Sometimes, magkaiba pa ang shoes ko!” Unsurprisingly, Janet’s pieces resemble collages put together like a designer’s look book of clothing illustrations. As the daughter of tailors, fashion figures largely in her compositions.
An onlooker for "Staring Finger Print" and "The Second Round"
Detail, "The Second Round"
“My pieces look like pages of a scrapbook, parang unfinished, ungrounded, raw. I put in what seem to be random elements, pero may meaning lahat yon.” Beneath the insouciance, the brilliant hues, and the trendy vibe, lie deeply personal stories. In this exhibit, Peeling Peaches For The Sharpest Tongue, she fills her canvases with various depictions of herself, each one a narrative of her life in Beijing. She includes mementos gathered as she partied and painted her way around the Chinese capital.
Janet Balbarona, "Online Candy"
Janet moved to China in 2008, four years after graduating with a Fine Arts degree from Far Eastern University, and a year after a stint in Perth doing commissioned portraits for an aboriginal rights group. In Beijing, she gravitated around the club scene, hanging out with DJs and young fashion designers. Inevitably, Janet hooked up with some artists and started working on her art. The galleries in the 798 arts district, although interested in her portfolio, felt that the market would not take her seriously until she had a few one-man exhibits in her resume. Early in 2009, she headed home to make her Manila debut. Her pieces have since found their way into the collections of the local art cognoscenti.
Janet Balbarona, "Sweet Thoughtfulness"
In this current body of work, Janet weaves images of peaches into all her paintings. She throws them in, innocuous and hardly apparent, amidst her self-portraits. The peaches and peach blossoms serve as ornaments, the same way they adorn classical Chinese paintings. You can tell which of her works relive good memories. For these, Janet renders her peaches plump, pink, juicy. Otherwise, she depicts them rotten and decayed, decomposing amidst scavenging rats.
Janet’s pieces possess the frankness of Janet herself. She goes through unexpected lengths to portray the truth. Before she could bring herself to get started on this show, even as her canvases had already been stretched and primed, and her frocks lay waiting to be slipped on, she found herself flying to Hong Kong. She spent a week seeking closure to an incident that she wanted to include in this exhibit. Her paintings deliver sincerity in a stylish package.
Janet
If each painting recounts an episode, then this entire show can be viewed as a full account of Janet Balbarona’s eventful year. Through her pieces, we find ourselves vicariously reliving the life of a hip, peripatetic romantic. Manuel de Cervantes may actually have a word for her: quixotic.
Peeling Peaches For The Sharpest Tongue runs from 22 February to 12 March 2010 at Blanc Makati, 2E Crown Tower, 107 Dela Costa St., Salcedo Village, Makati. Phone (632)752-0032 or visit http://www.blanc.ph
Janet Balbarona, "Staring Finger Print"
This post is a slightly edited version of my article for Rogue Magazine Feb 2010 issue. See http://www.rogue.ph
In Focus: Mac Valdezco
In what must be a first in Manila, the newly-opened Picasso Boutique Serviced Residences in Salcedo Village in Makati has
launched its art program. Done hand-in-hand with Art Cabinet Philippines, the hotel makes its public areas and third floor gallery available as venues for showcasing art. Along with room service, guests can look forward to changing exhibits, even on each
Mac Valdezco, "Invisible Pilot"
floor’s elevator foyer. Continue reading
Mark Justiniani likes to play. Not many people know that Mark uses clay to prepare for his paintings. He molds his figures, shapes them with his hands, and creates miniature tableaux of his narratives. He studies the resulting three-dimensional scenes for nuances of light and shadow that he translates into his painted images.
Detail, "Aiming for Windmills"
Mark Justiniani enjoys paradoxes. His pieces, especially his paintings on canvas and on wood, frequently employ graphic puns that fool around with the titles of his pieces or the absurdity of his images. He also enjoys working with mirrors, using them as devices to aid his visual tricks. For his 2005 piece, Bipolar, he attached a scratchboard that spelled out God against a mirror of roughly the same size. Seen through the mirror, his stylized letters transform into the word Bad. Mark loves to dwell on these juxtapositions, this coming together of opposite sides.
Mark Justiniani identifies with the Pinoy. His love for Philippine language, history, and culture pervades throughout his work. He peppers his visuals with uniquely Pinoy touches: Jose Rizal holding on to a flagpole for dear life, the Illustrado who wears a hat too big for his head, OFWs sailing away on a fragile paper boat. Underlying this is a close affinity to Pinoy humor. Even as he tackles the social realities of the day, Mark’s pieces retain the sense of self-deprecating whimsy that is so Filipino.
Detail, "Aiming For Windmills"
Mark Justiniani brings all these together, crystallizing all the elements that he uses as an artist, into a show of supersized proportions. Working with curator Patrick Flores, Mark propels to a new direction with Malikmata, a major solo exhibit opening this month at SLab.
Mark Justiniani "A Jar of Fireflies"
To move his art forward, Mark journeys back to his boyhood. He takes accoutrements from a bucolic childhood spent in the sugar fields of Bacolod, and morphs them into gigantic, interactive objects and installations in resin, glass, mirrors, and steel. Lola Basyang meets Anish Kapoor.
Malikmata means blink of an eye, and indeed, walking around his pieces will make viewers do a double take. Aiming For Windmills is a six-foot- high slingshot fabricated in steel, the two points of its yoke connected by a rubber band 20 feet long. It tilts to one side, ready to take aim with its bullet, a silicone head two feet in diameter. A resin palm-sized firely hovers in its vicinity.
As a young boy Mark ran around catching spiders. He sat listening to tales of aswang and duwende. He snuck out at dusk chasing fireflies. His pieces allow you to glory in these reminiscences.
Detail of Agtabayon's chain mail with carabao horn inserts
Marvel at Collision, the four-foot -long matchbox of resin and steel, painted to resemble the box of Sunset matches from the 1970s, slid open to reveal enormous crossed matchsticks and Agtabayon, a pre-colonial Filipino diety in full battle armor. He fiercely protects the Philippines against a menacing spider decked in the battle gear of a Spanish conquistador. Waiting in the wings, ready to spin its deadly web is another spider who symbolizes the American invader. With its multiple components, I find this to be the most interesting piece of the show.
Mark Justiniani, "Collision"
Feel the sides of the man-sized Jar of Fireflies, made to simulate glass, translucent from the glow of fist-sized fireflies electronically blinking from within. Peer through peepholes that bore through three sides of Council, a nuno sa punso’s chest-high mound of fiberglass and steel shavings. Each set of peepholes show the goblins in varying states of battle. Avoid the stare of the fiberglass tikbalang mounted high on a resin shirt of a child it has preyed on.
The pre-colonial diety, Agtabayon, standing up against the Spanish conquistador spider
As Patrick Flores describes it, Mark “…lapses into childhood in this exhibition, a wonderful place to be …he is able to take a pause from painting to recover the sense of play and image before “art.” It is a transition period in his practice, and uncannily he surrounds himself with artifacts of perception or the “techniques of the observer” that afford him a double vision, so to speak: a look back at the past and a glimpse into a possible future.”
Detail of spider as spanish conquistador
Mark Justiniani spent months doodling, filling six sketchbooks with ideas for this show. He forged and reforged maquettes in clay. He built wooden prototypes and consulted with experts. All his energies culminate in this fantastic display that Manila’s art scene has not witnessed before.
Mark Justiniani, "Ligaw'
One piece in this exhibit stands out for its normal proportions. Inscribed on a strip of metal, which he pleated just as an accordion, are the words Tayo Na Kinupkop Sa Sinag ng Dilim. Stand to the right and the words blend together to read Takipsilim. Dusk. That special time when day melds into the night, and it is neither light nor dark. A paradox that Mark Justiniani revels in, that point of evolution that echoes just where he himself currently stands.
Detail of spider as an American GI
One view of "Takipsilim"
Another view, "Takipsilim"
Malikmata runs from 19 February to 13 March 2010 at SLab, 2F YMC Bldg. 2, 2320 Pasong Tamo Extension, Makati City. Phone (632)816-0044 or visit http://www.slab.silverlensphoto.com
Mark Justinian, "Ligaw" at upper left, and "Council"
Note: This post is reprinted from an article I wrote for the February 2010 issue of Rogue Magazine. See http://www.rogue.ph
Julie Lluch, Mark Justiniani, Gilda Cordero Fernando, Dawn Atienza, and Joy Mallari
Haraya Ching takes a peep into Council
A peep through "Council"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsQ_W0mgrKk