It is hard to believe that more than four decades have passed since what we now know as the Saturday Group of Artists first got together. Of course, membership was vastly different then, and of the Group’s pioneers, quite a few have passed on.
The ones who survived have since been joined and replaced in the Group’s active roster by dozens of new members over the years – many of whom have become artistic luminaries inn their own right, and who have, in turn, mentored and influenced other young Filipino artists. In this way, the Group itself has grown and remained dynamic, open to new ideas and possibilities, even as it has striven to maintain the highest standards of artistic imagination and execution.
Those of us who have been with the Group for quite a while can be proud of this tradition of membership, alongside the openness to innovation that any collective artistic endeavor requires. Art in the Philippines has never been an easy advocacy to promote – although Philippine culture and society would be unimaginable without the contributions of our visual artists – and every artist today still has to fight for his or her own space, literally and figuratively, in the minds and hearts of our people.
It is perhaps a hallmark of this new Saturday Group that we have chosen to meet regularly in malls – rather than in the private studios and small cafes of the old days – to re-establish our connection to the public at large, and the connection to art itself to the public sphere. We believe in the specialness of art, but we also believe in its accessibility. We do not mind it if people watch us as we work, or if people wonder about our paintings; it is that wonderment that we seek to share, whether it is inspired by the steeple of a church or a bouquet of roses or the sinews of workers.
This book celebrates the Saturday Group’s traditions and hallmarks, and showcases the best of our members’ work. Among us, it will evoke many memories of the Saturdays we shared together, both the good and maybe not so good, moments we will cherish to our last canvases. But it is also an offering to the public that we value, a sharing of images that we hope will cause more than a few readers to see beneath the surface of the world we know – which is every artist’s dream. These are the dreams we saw; this is our dream realized, which we hope you will enjoy.
The Saturday Group Art Book
Written and designed by Migs Villanueva
Foreword by Mauro Malang Santos, Cris Crz and Buds Convocar
2007
For sales and other inquiries,
Please contact Buds Convocar
+639209208149
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