FINE ARTS students from the UST Graduate School and the artists’ group “Sining Happens” embodied Filipino culture in an exhibit titled “Ganap,” held at the Beato Angelico Gallery last April 8.
Sining Happens aims to drum up the consciousness of Filipinos on “visual identity” or the lack of it.
The exhibit featured works of Chester Ocampo, Arnold Abad, Jonathan Arazadon, Kris Bernabe-Pascual, Aze Clara, Eunice Ching, Albert Dalisaymo, Ron Mariñas, Miguel Obrique, Rosalie Nimo, Nikki Pascual, Ella Rumbaoa and Ameeh Tuazon.
The group believes that in the age of globalization, nationalism has become a scant commodity.
Sining Happens co-founder Ocampo said the Filipinos should “feel” their national visual identity.
“Our national visual identity isn’t simply lines and colors; it is something you should feel, something that all Filipinos should feel,” he said.
His series, titled “Digital Butterfly Series,” showed the stages of a butterfly transformation: “Formative Cocooning,” “Emergence,” “Flight Path,” “Landing Plan,” “Over the Pockets” and “The Journey.”
Environmentalist Bernabe-Pascual used textile waste in “All that Shimmers,” a painting of a polluted body of water.
Comic Illustrator Abad showed a fierce woman armed with a bow and arrow in “Intimidation,” an acrylic-on-wood painting.
In “Kamusmusan (Childhood),” Dalisaymo used coffee and oil paint on a banig or a handwoven mat.
Fine Arts instructor Arzadon’s “Harmony of the Body and Spirit” is a sculptural representation of a dynamic spherical movement of Aikido, the Japanese martial art.
“We are in search of our own style. For now, we have inspirations but eventually, we have to find our own,” Arzadon said.
Designer Calara used foam boards, multi-colored acetate and black acrylic paint to create a series of artworks that explore the balance of the symmetrical and asymmetrical in “Unasymmetry.”
“[I] highlighted abstract and non-mainstream class. [I] wanted to explore different kinds of mediums,” Calara said.
Ocampo said the exhibit marked the establishment of a Philippine visual identity.
“Hopefully, Filipinos would eventually come to appreciate arts more. Bayan natin ang makikinabang dito.”
Calara and Ocampo, along with fellow visual artists Mark Reyes, Nimo, Rae Billano and Neil Cabacungan, founded Sining Happens. Nolene Beatrice H. Crucillo
