Benjie Torrado Cabrera, Renato Habulan, Fred Liongoren, Arnel Mirasol and Pinggot Zulueta join forces, so to speak, in a show to assert the significance of paper in art making.
Habulan, who curates the show laments the seeming disinterest by art collectors in works on paper, because perhaps of the perceived perishability of such works. The works to be exhibited easily belies the fallacy of that perception, most of which though done in the 80’s and 90’s, are still in mint condition.
Cabrera, Liongoren, Mirasol and Zulueta will show their output in the so-called popular mediums of fine prints, comics and book illustration, and editorial cartooning. Paintings on paper, which are one of a kind, are deliberately downplayed to highlight the role played by the popular mediums not only in providing entertainment, but also in advocating causes; roles where they are very effective because of their wider reach and easier accessibility by the bigger public.
Habulan, meanwhile, will put on view for the first time the pencil studies for his big paintings. Pencil studies, though not really done in multiples, reinforce further the five artists’ point of view about the significance of paper in art making; because they are proof that paintings, except those composed digitally or painted alla prima, are first conceived and endowed primal forms in a matrix made of paper.
Benjie Torrado Cabrera finished Fine Arts at the University of Santo Tomas. He currently teaches in St. Scholastica’s College, and is an active member of the Printmakers Association of the Philippines. He had extensively exhibited his fine prints of cosmic and quasi-surreal imagery. He also had a solo show once of engravings done, not on paper, but on large flexiglass cubes - a pioneering work for which he deserves commendation and critical acclaim.
Renato Habulan , a Fine Arts graduate from the University of the East (UE), has also taught in St. Scholastica’s. He is into painting full time nowadays, and is just back from Singapore where he exhibited his latest works. Habulan was noticed and given rave reviews by art critics in the 1980s when he mounted solo shows at the Hiraya Gallery and Gallery Genesis, two of the more prestigious galleries operating at that time. He is one of the stalwart pillars of the Social Realist Movement in the Philippines. Although he became well-known for his iconic images of farmers and workers, Habulan had lately varied his theme to delve into the manifestations of the Filipinos’ religious psyche.
Fred Liongoren, who came from the University of the Philippines, attained prominence early, in the late 1960s, for his distinct brand of abstraction, which won for him the Grand Prize in the 1971 AAP Competition on the theme of 400 Years of Christianity in the Philippines. He was the subject of articles in the Asia Magazine and other publications where he was consistently dubbed as an artist to watch. Liongoren has not stopped at just doing abstract works though; he is an expert in the realist technique and also tries his hand at comics illustration. At present, he is a passionate advocate of “re-greening” or reforestation. Liongoren is a vibrant raconteur who can always delight his listeners with anecdotes laced with self-deprecating humor.
Arnel Mirasol took up fine arts in UST and UE. His paintings in the 1980s, while belonging to the Social Realist School, was tempered somewhat with color and surrealist humor. He had worked as an editorial cartoonist for a time. From the late 1990s onward, he focused his efforts in picture book illustration. In 2007, he showed a resurgent interest in serious painting, when he exhibited with his fairy tale illustrations his acrylics and oils.
Pinggot Zulueta is a lifestyle photographer of a daily newspaper. A UST alumnus, he started his professional art career as an editorial cartoonist for widely circulated publications . His cartoons - which will compare favorably with the works of the luminaries of Philippine editorial cartooning - are true political cartoons, because they are in most ways satirical and adversarial, and not mere paeans to the powers-that-be. Zulueta also a painter and had shown similarly powerful works in solo exhibitions here, Australia, and the United States.
Contact Details:
For inquiries, please call Chari Elinzano at (63 2) 635- 6061.
Habulan, who curates the show laments the seeming disinterest by art collectors in works on paper, because perhaps of the perceived perishability of such works. The works to be exhibited easily belies the fallacy of that perception, most of which though done in the 80’s and 90’s, are still in mint condition.
Cabrera, Liongoren, Mirasol and Zulueta will show their output in the so-called popular mediums of fine prints, comics and book illustration, and editorial cartooning. Paintings on paper, which are one of a kind, are deliberately downplayed to highlight the role played by the popular mediums not only in providing entertainment, but also in advocating causes; roles where they are very effective because of their wider reach and easier accessibility by the bigger public.
Habulan, meanwhile, will put on view for the first time the pencil studies for his big paintings. Pencil studies, though not really done in multiples, reinforce further the five artists’ point of view about the significance of paper in art making; because they are proof that paintings, except those composed digitally or painted alla prima, are first conceived and endowed primal forms in a matrix made of paper.
Benjie Torrado Cabrera finished Fine Arts at the University of Santo Tomas. He currently teaches in St. Scholastica’s College, and is an active member of the Printmakers Association of the Philippines. He had extensively exhibited his fine prints of cosmic and quasi-surreal imagery. He also had a solo show once of engravings done, not on paper, but on large flexiglass cubes - a pioneering work for which he deserves commendation and critical acclaim.
Renato Habulan , a Fine Arts graduate from the University of the East (UE), has also taught in St. Scholastica’s. He is into painting full time nowadays, and is just back from Singapore where he exhibited his latest works. Habulan was noticed and given rave reviews by art critics in the 1980s when he mounted solo shows at the Hiraya Gallery and Gallery Genesis, two of the more prestigious galleries operating at that time. He is one of the stalwart pillars of the Social Realist Movement in the Philippines. Although he became well-known for his iconic images of farmers and workers, Habulan had lately varied his theme to delve into the manifestations of the Filipinos’ religious psyche.
Fred Liongoren, who came from the University of the Philippines, attained prominence early, in the late 1960s, for his distinct brand of abstraction, which won for him the Grand Prize in the 1971 AAP Competition on the theme of 400 Years of Christianity in the Philippines. He was the subject of articles in the Asia Magazine and other publications where he was consistently dubbed as an artist to watch. Liongoren has not stopped at just doing abstract works though; he is an expert in the realist technique and also tries his hand at comics illustration. At present, he is a passionate advocate of “re-greening” or reforestation. Liongoren is a vibrant raconteur who can always delight his listeners with anecdotes laced with self-deprecating humor.
Arnel Mirasol took up fine arts in UST and UE. His paintings in the 1980s, while belonging to the Social Realist School, was tempered somewhat with color and surrealist humor. He had worked as an editorial cartoonist for a time. From the late 1990s onward, he focused his efforts in picture book illustration. In 2007, he showed a resurgent interest in serious painting, when he exhibited with his fairy tale illustrations his acrylics and oils.
Pinggot Zulueta is a lifestyle photographer of a daily newspaper. A UST alumnus, he started his professional art career as an editorial cartoonist for widely circulated publications . His cartoons - which will compare favorably with the works of the luminaries of Philippine editorial cartooning - are true political cartoons, because they are in most ways satirical and adversarial, and not mere paeans to the powers-that-be. Zulueta also a painter and had shown similarly powerful works in solo exhibitions here, Australia, and the United States.
Contact Details:
For inquiries, please call Chari Elinzano at (63 2) 635- 6061.
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Paper Power
by Nickky Faustine De Guzman
March 2, 2015
Paper may be lightweight but its power isn’t. What’s written or drawn or drafted on it is indelible, memorable. Great histories are documented on paper. Poets write their feelings on paper. Journalists jot down their facts on paper. We read books and news on print. We doodle on paper. The bestselling ideas, the most revolutionary ideals find expression on book paper. But some artists have problems with it. Isn’t it ironic?
Art galleries, it turns out, shun paper artwork because of its lack of commercial value. Plus, according to them, they don’t last well. Or they do? The works of romantic painters Francisco Jose de Goya and Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn, to name a few, have lasted a lifetime.
“Despite the long history of printmaking dating back to the early ‘60s, paper as a medium has to be nurtured—like a child,” says artist Renato Habulan. Also the curator, he is one of the members, in the recently concluded paper art exhibit of 12 Pinoy artists called “Papelmismo.”
The exhibit is the sequel of their successful joint in 2012 exhibit dubbed “Papelismo,” back when they were only five artists. The first exhibit is a word play of papel and –ismo (kapitalismo, komunismo, sosyalismo). It centered on the political and social turmoil in the country during the ‘70s and ‘80s, the heyday of the artists’ careers.
Papelmismo, on the other hand, highlights the word “mismo” (exactly). This time, the 12 artists Benjie Torrado-Cabrera, Alfredo Liongoren, Arnel Mirasol, Thomas Daquioag, Neil Doloriicon, Alfredo Esquillo, Egai Talusan Fernandez, Emmanuel Garibay, Pablo Baen Santos, Allison Wong David, and Manila Bulletin Lifestyle’s very own Pinggot Zulueta, manipulated the papers and turned them into works of fancy. There’s a 3D paper cutout. There’s a termite-eaten paper magically turned seemingly into a painting, but not really. There’s a papier-mâché sculpture. And some folded paper bills, too.
Besides utilizing paper, the group proved that paper power could expand, not only in content, but also in form.
“This time, the medium is the message. There are no painted artworks but only imageries made from paper. The paper is the emotion of the artists,” says Renato.
The artists also remained true on their first theme, which is social realism. Among the artworks were Thomas Daquioag’s Binasurang Papel, inspired from Nora Aunor’s iconic line “my brother is not a pig” and his commentary on Nora’s “binasurang papel” when the government snubbed her major contributions in the film industry when she didn’t make the cut as a National Artist.
Pinggot Zulueta’s Ang Papel Ko, meanwhile, is a 3D collage of his editorial cartoons and some books and magazines he ripped to come up with a playful intersection of texts and images that convey social observations. “I want to be experimental. I don’t like it too profound to the point that nobody understands it. What you see is what you get,” he says.
But why focus on paper? The artists are all connected with paper—as a painter, as a journalist, as a printmaker, as an editorial cartoonist, and as a book illustrator, among others. Beyond this, however, Renato says the group wants to upgrade the seemingly “second-class rate” of paper as a medium of art. The group, which Renato jovially calls “oldies,” also wants to prove that they are not to be relegated in the periphery. According to him, art galleries nowadays snub old artists and favor the younger, more contemporary ones. They want to prove, that like paper, they are here to stay. The movement continues. This year, the group, which continues to grow, is plotting their third exhibit and calling it, “Ang Papel Mo,” a question of one’s role in life and society.
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