Shock for shock’s sake
CCP’s ongoing “Kulo” art exhibit and Mideo M. Cruz’s “Polytheism”
By: Lito B. Zulueta
Philippine Daily Inquirer
8:30 am Monday, August 8th, 2011
(The author is PDI Lifestyle section’s Arts and Books editor)
The furor over Mideo M. Cruz’s “Polytheism” is understandable. In the true spirit of contemporary art, the work is calculated to be offensive; it is blasphemous and sacrilegious.
If modern art has the shock of the new, contemporary art has the jolt of the jugular. If modern art is art for art’s sake, contemporary art is shocking for shock’s sake.
Now we can’t get over the shock. And if “Polytheisms” is to be faulted at all, it is that its shock value has largely detracted the public from the larger picture of the exhibit, “Kulo.”
Curated by multimedia artist Jaime Pacena and Fine Arts professor Jocelyn Tullao-Calubayan, “Kulo,” ongoing at the Bulwagang Juan Luna (Main Gallery) of the Cultural Center of The Philippines (CCP), gathers artists and writers who have studied at the University of Santo Tomas, the cradle of modern art in the Philippines.
Although it is being held in conjunction with the 400th anniversary this year of UST, it is not sanctioned by the Dominicans; it is not an official UST Quadricentennial activity. The exhibit is also held in connection with the 150th birth anniversary of Jose Rizal, arguably the most prominent alumnus of UST. But again the caveat: The exhibit is not sanctioned by Rizalistas.
Although not officially sanctioned by the Pontifical University, “Kulo” is however a “Thomasian” enterprise. It cannot be avoided. “In essence, this is also an unofficial ‘All-Thomasian Artist Exhibition’ in relation to the 400th year celebration,” explained Tullao-Calubayan. “It hopes to re-evaluate the contributions of the Thomasian artists, outside the confines of the University structure itself, (and connect them) to the art dialogues and communities in the Philippines since the 1970s.”
The title of the exhibit refers to the state when things simmer and boil, obviously brought to that point by art coming into contact with the social and historical moment. And the exhibit has been able to achieve this through the works of the contributing artists, and not alone Mideo M. Cruz’s “Polytheisms.”
