AUDIENCE engagement was the “x factor” for the Association of Pinoyprintmaker’s (A/P) annual exhibit titled “Hands On: Touch, Engage, Create,” held last June 20 at the Cultural Center of the Philippines.
The exhibit featured collaborative artworks by different members of the association, making it the first interactive exhibit to be launched by the group.
“The group’s advocacy is to reach art for the masses. That was the objective of Mr. Rodriguez, the founder of the association,” fine arts alumnus Benjie Cabrera, president of A/P, told the Varsitarian. “We’re just continuing the legacy.
Cabrera’s “From the Center” challenged the audience to create their own origami cranes using rubbercut prints.
“Paper cranes symbolize peace, and it was sort of a symbol in the [Second World] War… there’s a focal point in the center, and the idea is to enlarge and to widen,” he added.
Fellow painting graduate Salvador “Buddy” Ching called for “gender inclusivity” through his acrylic on canvas “Rehistro,” which encourages the audience to stamp their thumbprint on their preferred gender category: male, female or neutral.
“The concept is about the identity crisis of the person, and the thumb-mark is the original identity of a person… through my artwork, I wanted a collaboration with the original stamp of the thumb,” Ching explained.
Ambie Abaño, an alumnus of the College of Architecture, channeled her interest in identity and personality in her work “Re-cinfiguration,” which had engravings of different faces and expressions in blocks of wood that audiences can assemble and disassemble.
“I create the different facial expressions which represent our inseparable sub-personalities,” Abaño said.
Mars Bugaoan, who graduated with a degree in advertising arts in 2009, gave sets of rubber stickers as part of his artwork titled “Genesis,” compelling audiences to arrange their selection of stickers in their preferred manner.
Rhoda Recto, a faculty member of the Graduate School, showed a slice of life in her piece “Tree of Life,” a three-dimensional model of a tree made out of rubber, acrylic and paper.
Lining the tree trunk with payment bills, Recto left the branches of the model bare, leaving it to the audience to add leaves with written messages.
Former fine arts professor Noell El Farol displayed his mixed-media piece “Pinalakas: D.I.Y Disposable Anting-Anting,” which offers a selection of designs of disposable “anting-anting” figurines to be stamped with rubbercut images.
The exhibit runs until Aug. 11, with lectures and talks by A/P’s partner artists scheduled for the duration of the run.
