SANCTUS

SAME AS IT NEVER WAS

Cris Villanueva Jr.

Same as it Never Was

16 December 2008 - 5 January 2009

The retrospective renegade asserts itself through voluminous remakes, covers, renditions, revival, recycles - a complete rewind of what might be a hang up, a nostalgia, a strong personal impression that it is either irreconcilably never easy to forget, or simply the tendency to go back into a time where one might pick himself up for the now, so much so that it is evident to most music, fashion, film, visual art. A critique might recklessly say, "same, same", but hey...

The post of the modern world blurs most of what the old and the new know, it is perfectly twisted where it does not claim a single remark, to its absolute - it claims to all remarks uniquely. The post of the modern world is not static though it is and can be linear to change, but an ever sine of change. Sameness is but an illusion of what appears to be absolutely different things.

Cris Villanueva's show, entitled Same As It Never Was, is a collection of pieces in 4'x4', 3'x3' and 2'x2' frames. This one-man show is made to look as if this is a group show since each work is intentionally done in a different style, as to Villanueva who wants to go against the notion that one should have a particular style in painting'. Not to literally leave an artist mark or from what is openly said about the artist's signature.

The approach to painting using oil, for his work particularly entitled Something For Everyone, is a reproduction of a photo of a group show of small paintings dated back in 1987, it's a new work with a historical setting, yet it is blurred by the artist's style in painting, and is produced into a new light and kind of visual art technique. Taking note to works which are all original, though reproductions from other artists' work.

From the pack of redundant figures and things of the past to the present, the post of the modern world does not at all rewind a hang up nor a nostalgia, but simply asserts the new aesthetics of today and asserts the artist's accumulated grown idea being the artist that he is. It is very well "same, same" but really "different".

Same As It Never Was opens on 16 December 2008, and runs until 5 January 2009 at Mag:net Ayala. Mag:net Gallery Ayala, is at the ground floor of The Columns Tower 1, at the corner of Ayala Avenue and Buendia. For details or inquiries, contact the gallery at 929-31-91 or email info@magnetgalleries.com or visit www.magnetgalleries.com

HALAD HAN PASKO 2008

It is indeed fitting for the Visual Artists of Tacloban City to come into a collective exhibit where they could express their creative catharsis situated in the times of dynamic change...the ever burgeoning transition of the City to a “Highly Urbanized” society.

Yet deep in these “Urban Legends” hearts they still retain the folkways of the old, the convivium of the present and the hopes of the future…

Under the support and auspices of the Tacloban Sangyaw Foundation, the Artists of Tacloban gathered together to form the KANSIAGU Visual Arts Collective in reminiscence of the historic Pintado Rajah: Siagu (“Siani” in other chronicles), as evidence that they have never forgotten their creative past, as harbringers of artistry thru motifs and designs of the Pintado tattoo…

This exhibit showcases the fervor of these Tacloban Visual Artists amalgamating the past, the present and what is to come for the Tacloban Art Scene...Let as do hope, this fervor remains in every Artist’s hearts in every Christmas season now and always…

Dulce Cuna Anacion

Curator

In memoriam to Bobbi Valenzona (in inspiration for curatorial work)

PERPETUAL CREATION

PERPETUAL CREATION: ANDREW DE GUZMAN AT AYALA MUSEUM

The Ayala Museum presents “Perpetual Creation,” the first solo exhibition of Andrew Alto de Guzman, at the Artist Space, 2nd Floor, Ayala Museum , Makati Avenue , Makati City from December 16 – 31, 2008.

Based in Pulilan, Bulacan, Andrew graduated with a Management degree at the De la Salle University. He has participated in eighteen group exhibits, the first at the DLSU Art Gallery in 1993, and the most recent was at Galerie Anna this October 2008. A co-founder of the Jefarca Arts and Historical Society, Andrew was also instrumental in the establishment of the community museum of Pulilan , the Museo San Ysidro de Pulilan. Andrew also organized the First Bulacan Art Festival in 2003, and has executed major sculptural projects in the Philippines (The Great Cross of Malolos at Malolos Cathedral ) and in New York, U.S.A. (Convergence III at Smithtown).

“Perpetual Creation” is composed of ten paintings measuring from three by three to four by four feet. The paintings are abstract evocations of natural phenomena and the creative forces of nature that the artist has encoded and reworked into unusual but refreshing visions of form, color, and plane. With hints of cubistic strokes interspersed with washes and deft flat-tipped brush marks which segue from black and white to brilliant flashes of blue, red, and yellow, these paintings synthesize abstract elements derived from natural observation found in the work of such artists as Georges Braque, Jose Joya, Vicente Manansala, and Federico Aguilar Alcuaz. Andrew’s choice of subjects based on nature is his attempt to fuse his observations of the natural world with his meditations on the significance of natural forces, especially during their act of creation: the breaking of a new day, the fall of rain or the blazing power of the sun, and the flow of waters and winds that bring life to everything they touch.

For details, please call Andrew Alto de Guzman at Mobile # 0918-900-60-21, or email at aadeguzman2@yahoo.com.

URGENT PAINTINGS

TREK VALDIZNO
URGENT Paintings


Opens Sunday 14 December 2008 4:00 pm
Exhibition runs till Friday 9 January 2009

Artis Corpus Gallery
303 Haig Street Mandaluyong City
artiscorpusgallery@yahoo.com
Telephone 7174619

Conversations with the artist and presentation of the video-catalogue by exhibition curator Sandra Palomar on Thursday 8 January 2009



Trek Valdizno’s body of work is the only one of its kind that can account for, if need be, a genre of lyrical non-objectivism in the history of modern art in the Philippines. As a student at the U.P. College of Fine Arts, he was executing drawings with remarkable ease, in astounding number and at an incredible pace that went beyond an academic exercise called “a hundred drawings.”

With at least one solo show and three group exhibitions annually in the past seventeen years, the local art scene has familiarized with Valdizno’s imagery, familiar enough for early opponents to lose interest in challenging his chosen visual language. But how much more palatable have his drawings really become to viewers who are quick to dismiss abstraction as mindless scribbling?

Valdizno is above all a master draftsman in a novel way. With his brush he is able to draw paint. This may be a way to begin appreciating his abstraction. In his work only paint exists and we are witness to what it can literally do. In spite of myriad interpretations aroused by his sumptuous vocabulary of forms and figures, what is essential in the artist’s laboring is the transfer of terrestrial vibrations to his matter.

For his 25th solo exhibition at the Artis Corpus Gallery, Valdizno’s stimulus comes from making images out of “cotton like buttons”. The preamble to this new body of work in contrast to the complexity of what the artist achieves cannot be any simpler or more banal, making it appear that he is quick to grab any motif if only to prod and probe his materials.

Much more than a materialist, he is not merely content attributing adjectives to paint. Paint must skid, slide, fatten, thin, glisten, fly, chatter, quiver, tumble, soften, harden, laugh and cry. Valdizno’s act of drawing is a vehicle to infuse paint with verbs that make it live and breathe as if human.

More innocently than idealistically, Valdizno allows his gestures to do everything to pigment creating a picture more delicious than candy. He waits patiently till the last minute for a crucial starting point that will allow him to draw for hours and days on end, spewing works by the hundreds, unapologetic of his abstractions done over and over again. He will even deliver his paintings wet. It is the only thing he can imagine doing very urgently.

Trek Valdizno’s URGENT exhibition opens on Sunday, 14 December 2008, at 4 pm at the Artis Corpus Gallery, 303 Haig Street Mandaluyong City. Exhibition runs till Friday 9 January 2009. Conversations with the artist and presentation of the video-catalogue by exhibition curator Sandra Palomar will be held on Thursday 8 January 2009. Interested parties may call 7174619.

Written by
Sandra Palomar
Exhibition Curator

AGAINST MY BLACKHEARTED WORLD

Lynyrd Paras delivers his third solo exhibition Against My Blackhearted World with a passion and sincerity that we have come to expect of his work. Confronted by this group of seven paintings, one bears witness to a kind of psychosocial world symptomatic of the erosive decay of contemporary urban life, what could be described as a weathering of the spirit. These are deeply personal paintings.

While Against My Blackhearted World is an exhibition of great emotional challenge, it does not overshadow its audience with darkness. There is strength in its fire and illumination that pulls the portraits from their murky backgrounds, at times with a clumsy unease, but with a sensitivity and conviction in who they are. Paras' figures have great humanity. They are not wooden or wrapped in social ideals or art fashion.

Against My Blackhearted World opens on Sunday, December 14, 2008 6PM at the blanc compound 359 Shaw Blvd, Mandaluyong City. For More information please call/sms 752-0032/0920- 9276436, email info@blanc.ph or visit www.blanc.ph.

*excerpt from Gina Fairley's "Fiery Apparitions

EXPONENTIAL INFRINGEMENT

You are cordially invited to EXPONENTIAL INFRINGEMENT, an Art Exhibition by Cesare A.X. Syjuco, Lirio Salvador, Lynyrd Paras and Raffy Ignacio on December 12, 2008 at the Blueroom Art Gallery located at 1354 Lacuña cor Apolinario, Bangkal, Makati City. Opening at 7:00 in the evening with art performances, and music by Bobby Balingit, Tupada, Electric Underground Collective and Biscochong Halimaw.

ANI34

CCP features 62 writers in “Spirituality and Healing” book

10 December 2008, Pasay City – The Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) announced today that 62 writers are included in the annual literary anthology Ani. Ani, which means harvest in the Filipino language, is a project of CCP’s Literary Arts Division. For its 34th issue, Ani focused on the theme “Spirituality and Healing”, the book launching will be held on December 17, 7:00 p.m. at the CCP ramp.

The 62 writers who submitted prose and poetry featured in Ani 34 are Kris M. Alingod, Mark Angeles, Lilia F. Antonio, G. Mae B. Aquino, Carlos A. Arejola, Edgar Bacong, Isabela Banzon, Janet Tauro Batuigas, Gil S. Beltran, Herminio S. Beltran, Jr., Kristoffer Berse, Jaime Jesus Borlagdan, Nazzer C. Briguera, Catherine Candano, Desiree Caluza, Nonon Villaluz Carandang, Dexter B. Cayanes, Jose Jason L. Chancoco, Joey Stephanie Chua, Kristian Sendon Cordero, Genaro R. Gojo Cruz, Mario L. Cuezon, Maureen G. dela Cruz, Rodrigo V. Dela Peña, Jr., U Eliserio, Dennis Espada, Filipino L. Estacio, Rogerick F. Fernandez, Raul Funilas, Nena Gajudo-Fernandez, Jeneen R. Garcia, Luis P. Gatmaitan, Fernando R. Gonzalez, Erwin C. Lareza, Jeffrey A. Lubang, Nestor C. Lucena, Melba Padilla Maggay, Perry C. Mangilaya, Noahlyn Maranan, Francisco A. Monteseña, Ursula B. Nelson, Wilhelmina S. Orozco, Chuckberry J. Pascual, Noel P. Pinggoy, Dinah Roma-Sianturi, Hope Sabanpan-Yu, Joseph T. Salazar, Romel G. Samson, Aida F. Santos, Rakki Sison-Buban, Beverly W. Siy, Jason Genio Tabinas, Reynaldo Tamayo, Jr., Vincent Lester G. Tan, Dolores R. Taylan, Enrico C. Torralba, Gerardo Z. Torres, Joel H. Vega, Gina Verdolaga, Santiago B. Villafania, Ana Maria Yugalca, and Manuel Zacarias.

Herminio S. Beltran, Jr., CCP Literary Arts Division head and Ani 34 editor, wrote in the Introduction, “Reading the compilation of poems and prose in this year’s issue, there is indeed a close connection between creative or imaginative writing and spirituality, and with it, healing.” “It is as if the act of writing, and with it, reflection and meditation, is itself spirituality, which brings about healing, first in the writer, and consequently, the reader,” Beltran continued.

For inquiries on the next issue of Ani, which will delve on the experiences of the Filipinos in general and the Filipino writer in particular as members of the Asian community, please send an e-mail to aniyearbook@yahoo.com.

For inquiries or to schedule interviews, please contact Betty Uy-Regala at the following numbers: 0906-2604175; 832-1125 local 1706 (CCP Literary Arts Division) or email aniyearbook@yahoo.com.

EQUILIBRIUM

“EQUILIBRIUM” BY EGHAI ROXAS AT THE CCP

For the month of December, the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) proudly presents the solo exhibition of well-known Abstractionist Eghai Roxas titled “Equilibrium”, from December 11, 2008 until January 11, 2009. “Equilibrium” will bring together twelve large works that the noted Filipino artist has produced over the past year utilizing the artistic forms for which Roxas has been celebrated in the Manila artistic community. This includes the use of delicate monochromatic washes of black and white, allied with strategic gestural strokes, bold lines, globes, and circles with shadows to create a synthesis of Western and Asian Modern Art. Eghai’s “Equilibrium” touches on the artist’s meditations on the nature of existence, and the interactive balance between emotion, nature, and the elemental human struggle to redefine meaning and the relevance of art to the greater society.

To be opened on Thursday, December 11, 2008, 6PM at the Pasilyo Guillermo Tolentino, 3rd Floor Hallway, CCP Center for the Performing Arts, Roxas Boulevard, Manila, “Equilibrium” also retraces the odyssey that the noted painter, sculptor, and performance artist has undertaken since his days as one of the youngest members of the Social Realist movement that defined cutting-edge Philippine Art with a social heart during the Seventies. Inspired by the Modernist irony of Abstract Illusionism, especially those of American artist James Harvard in his advanced art studies in the United States after 1986, Eghai has managed to channel his concerns for depicting social issues, as well as his practisanal concerns via this form of contrasting abstract patterns and cast shadows that question the formalist strictures of Abstraction during the early-mid 20th Century, redefining art in the present as an evolution of motifs and meanings that result in synergy and synthesis. The use of elegant contrasts of dense textural grounds, minimalist background wash, thick gestural strokes, geometric planes, and illusional shadows on large, rectangular canvases also produces a hybrid combination of modern Western abstraction and traditional Asian calligraphy that best exemplify the uniqueness of Philippine Contemporary Art.

Eghai Roxas is a product of the prestigious University of the Philippines (UP) College of Fine Arts in 1980, under the tutelage of National Artist Jose Joya, Roberto Chabet, and Abstractionist Constancio Bernardo; and has worked under renowned maestros like Gawad CCP Para sa Sining awardee Jose “Pitoy” Moreno. Eghai has mounted major exhibitions in such locations as the Ayala Museum, the CCP, the Vienna International Center, Ad Infinitum Gallery in Chicago, and New York’s Puffin Room. He has won many awards and distinctions, including Juror’s Choice at the 1994 Philip Morris Philippine Art Awards; one of the Ten Most Outstanding Artists of the 1994 Diwa ng Sining Awards organized by the Rotary Club of Makati West; and First Prize in Non-Representational Painting at the 1997 AAP Annual Art Competition. He is also currently concerned with performance art as an extension of the canvas in terms of foregrounding meaning and relevance to the greater social community, having co-founded the Electric Underground Collective along with Cesare A.X. Syjuco, Jean Marie Syjuco, and Lirio Salvador. His opening reception for “Equilibrium” on December 11 will feature one such interactive performance piece titled “Cycles.”

For more details on Eghai Roxas’s “Equilibrium,” please call the CCP Coordinating Center for Visual Arts at Tel. # 832-3702.

TABLE/TOPS

Table/TOP at Galerie Anna

Galerie Anna, a world-class service provider of Philippine and Global Art in the national and international market, proudly presents for the month of December a major exhibition of recent works by renowned and upcoming Filipino sculptors. Titled “Table/TOP”, the exhibition features the works of members of the Society of Philippine Sculptors (SPS) and other sculptors, such as National Artist for Sculpture Napoleon Abueva, Ral Arrogante, Ferdie Cacnio, Mervy Pueblo, Rogger Basco, Byron Salarza, Jecky Alano, Eghai Roxas, Ronel Roces, Rey Contreras, Tala Contreras, Julie Luch, Juan Sajid Imao, Arnel Borja, Pablo Mahinay, Jojo Sagayno, Uly Veloso, Dan Raralio, Noell El Farol, Evan Bejec, Jerry Araos, Julian Araos, Jenny Cortez, Dion Gonzalez, and Lirio Salvador.

Opening on December 5, 2008, at 5PM, and continuing until January 10, 2009, “Table/TOP” is a compelling journey that provides a tantalizing solution to the perennial problems of making sculpture relevant and significant in these contemporary times. Sculpture in the Philippines must cope with enormous challenges of sourcing often-expensive materials, unpredictable markets, and frequently short-term planning. Often, the only socially relevant form of sculpture is the public monument or statue that stands on plazas or street corners. On the other hand, such sculptures also deny the possibility of including sculpture as part of the domestic, indoor or interior space of home, office, or study. This emphasis on the public but often-remote application of sculpture may be noble, but it also brings to mind why so much of the people feel alienated or distant to this form.

Tabletop-sized sculptures, on the other hand, are more conducive to the tangible experience of viewers, who can not only view them at closer range, often at table height (hence the term “table top”); they can also touch and feel their surfaces with greater precision, and time to size up the effect of the sculpture in relation to their users. Tabletops are often derided as “commercial-friendly” because of their portability—and thus their easy disposal. However, we must also remember that the pleasure of handling and moving these small sculptures is precisely part of their appeal among collectors, as well as ordinary people drawn to the intimacy of the scale—and thus greater interaction and understanding results, something that a public statue oftentimes cannot achieve.

“Table/TOP” thus looks at the phenomenon of the small but significant, and locates the force of art not at the table itself, but what is on top of it—the unique creations of three generations of Filipino artists who have inherited the tradition of sculpture from the giants of the 20th Century, as well as centuries of native traditions and modern innovations that have enriched our culture. This includes the expressionistic but humane figurative pieces of Napoleon Veloso Abueva, the first National Artist for Sculpture and former disciple of Conservative great, National Artist Guillermo Tolentino. Abueva’s Modernism, which came of age in the early-mid Fifties, is highly nuanced but elegant, reducing natural elements to gentle curves on hardwood or concrete; or the drama of human action and allegory in his figurative statuary, a Romantic sensibility that he inherited from his master. Then there is the figurative works of those who came of age in the Seventies, like Jerusalino Araos’ sinuous figurative pieces; Julie Lluch’s evocative curvaceous forms; the curvilinear abstracts of former Abueva disciple, and now New York City-based artists Pablo Mahinay; and the socially committed and indigenously-themed social realist works of husband-and-wife sculptors Rey Paz and Tala Isla Contreras.

In the Eighties and early Nineties, the sculptural works of emerging artists shows the heritage gained from the emergence of both abstract as well as figurative traditions in Philippine Modernism—the fusion of the two achieved through the tireless experimentation and courageous open-mindedness of Abueva and fellow National Artist Abdulmari Imao. Ral Arrogante’s subtle and infectiously cute “Scrapologies” made from recycled scrap metal; Eghai Roxas’s abstract boxes and cubes; Dan Raralio’s segues from an almost academic figurism to a totally abstracted minimalism; Noell El Farol’s innovative use of colored and collaged glass; Ulysses “Uly” Veloso’s ironic and psychologically-dense treatises; Arnel Borja’s deftly-executed “balancing” sculptures executed in refined metallic and machine-like forms; and Juan Sajid Imao’s equal emphasis on curvilinear abstraction and human figures were all part of this process of digesting and meditating upon the aesthetic landscape that emerged in the wake of the Filipino Modernist giants.

In the latter Nineties and into the Second Millennium, this process of expanding upon Philippine Sculpture also acknowledges the contributions of those of the regions outside Manila, such as Cavite-based Rogger Basco’s Art Deco-ish figurative minimalism; Cebuano sculptor Evan Bejec’s submlime curvilinear sculptures executed exclusively in hardwood; fellow Cebuano Jojo Sagayno’s recycled-from-the-garbage-bin metal sculptures; and Ilonggo potter Jecky Alano’s ceramic sculptures of rotund human bodies. The younger generation of sculptors has also continued to redefine the tabletop in terms of form and meaning. Lirio Salvador’s ingenious “sound sculptures” are reconfigured to question the solemnity and silences of the household; Mervy Pueblo’s muscular concrete forms encased in steel defy the expectations one assumes about “women’s art”, and Ferdie Cacnio’s brass human figures of dancers exemplify the concern for defying gravity and pushing the boundaries of media to its fullest.

To expand upon the importance of Philippine Sculpture on this exhibition, two major activities will also be held on the duration of this exhibition. On Tuesday, December 9, from 2-5PM, there will be a public discussion on Philippine Sculpture by selected participants of the exhibition. On Tuesday, January 6, 2008, the curator of the exhibition, Dr. Reuben Ramas Cañete, will deliver a lecture on “Philippine Contemporary Sculpture” from 2-4PM. Both events will be held at Galerie Anna. The public is also invited to witness and participate in this event.

Galerie Anna, the presenter of this show, is as much a gallery for young emergent artists as for celebrated artists recognized nationally and internationally. The Gallery aspires towards significant showings of Philippine Art and discerning fresh artistic ideas with a view to making connections with the wider audience. We believe in Art that probes new frontiers, pays homage to individuality, and emulates the diverse ideas and values of society that can be stimulating and enterprising, especially at this juncture when the plurality of its expression in the Philippines throws new challenges for artists. Located at 7/F Ramon Magsaysay Center, Roxas Boulevard corner Dr. J. Quintos Street, Malate, Manila, Galerie Anna maintains a high-profile name recall among artists, art lovers, artworld administrators, and collectors by mounting a robust, well-curated exhibition based on a professionally planned exhibition calendar. Such exhibitions of art works in all media - paintings, art prints, sculptures and mixed media works are also the avenues for art acquisitions for collection and investment.

For more details and information about “Table/TOP”, please call or contact the Gallery Manager at Tel. # 567-94-83; or email at info@galerieanna.com. You may also click your Web browser at http//:www.galerieanna.com.

TECHKNOW

"TECHKNOW AT THE BIG AND SMALL ART CO."

The Big and Small Art Co. proudly presents "TECHKNOW." This is the first solo exhibition of Derrick Macutay whose works have evolved from the thematic rural to the more insightful theme on humanity and technology. The montage of curated works combined establishes a dream-like nightmarish environment and co-existence of automatons, cyborgs and machines. It portrays visions of biomechanical humanoids.

Much influenced by the Swiss artist Hans Rudi Giger, Macutay’s figures and characters render a pictography of the current and a vision of what is beyond, via a portal or a gateway to the future; much to the preoccupation of the current generation in the latest in technology. Such can be vividly perceived in the piece “The Machines Are With Us, In Us.” And the awe and wonderment of a younger generation, suggesting altogether a future that is breathtaking and full of promise is all bound by the dictates of mechanical cables in the work “Fly Away Icarus.”

Macutay’s oeuvres clearly portrays the decay of what lies ahead and yet there is this aesthetic that thrusts the works to an echelon of that elegant beauty and the transcendent revelation of something wonderfully alien. The centerpiece of the exhibit is his painting “Ecce Homo Technologous” that won him a Jury Prize in the recent concluded Philip Morris Art Awards. Dr. Patrick Flores notes on the piece, “Behold the Man, Thus says Pilate when he presents Christ to the populace. There is persecution in this intricately textures and well-wrought painting. Half human, half automaton, the cyborg survives in an atmosphere of fumes and the toxic hues of ominous blue. In this brave new world of hypermedia and cyberspace, he is fastened to and enslaved by the machine, ensconced on a toilet seat, the data base of his embodied, dehumanized existence.”

Macutay’s pieces are a testament to the human imagination. Only the then-President of the Czech Republic and renowned playwright Václav Havel could have given a hopeful description of the postmodern world as one based on science, and yet paradoxically “where everything is possible and almost nothing is certain.”

In this post-postmodern arena of visual arts where artistic revolutions are made by a few key individuals and wherein at the heart of every revolution is an artist who achieves originality, Macutay presents a novel theme, employing the inventive use of composition, figure, and color to mark a beginning.


"TECHKNOW" opens on Wednesday, November 26, 2008, 6:00 p.m. at The Big and Small Art Co., located at The Artwalk, Level 4 Building A of the SM Megamall, Ortigas Complex, EDSA, Mandaluyong City. The exhibition will run until December 5, 2008.