 |
| Tampuhan (1895) by Juan Luna |
Victorio C. Edades (1895-1985) is the 1976 National Artist of the Philippines for the Visual Arts-Painting. Having introduced Modern Art to the Philippines, he has been called “Father of Modern Philippine Art,” a designation which, curiously, recapitulates the title “Father of Modern Art” assigned to Paul Cézanne, the Post-Impressionist painter whose style his most resembles.
Edades studied at the University of Washington, Seattle in the period 1919 to 1925, where he completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts and a Master of Fine Arts in Painting. Although he enrolled in architecture courses, he did not pursue his interest further.
Most significant in his artistic development was his exposure to over one thousand pieces in “The International Exhibition of Modern Art,” a touring exhibit that visited Seattle in 1922.
Joining art competitions in the U.S., he was further inspired when his painting “The Sketch” (1927) won second place in the Annual Exhibition of North American Artists.
Upon his return to the Philippines in 1928, he launched at the end of the year a one-man show of thirty paintings at the Philippine Columbia Club in Ermita, of which “The Builders” (1928) was the statement piece. It is a tribute to Cézanne’s flat shapes and strong outlines, although Edades chooses swarthy hues over the bright palette of the Post-Impressionists. His deep browns and dark greens suit the depiction of impoverished Philippine laborers. Endemic poverty—it is visible almost everywhere—is a recurring motif in the Philippine visual arts.
“The Builders” is very large, 1.05 x 3.67 m or 3.66 x 12.04 feet approximately.
None of his exhibit paintings sold. We might say that Edades mounted the first Salon des Refusés, a solo at that, in the Philippines.
In 1930 Edades participated in founding the Department of Architecture at the University of Santo Tomas (UST); he was appointed its acting head, and in 1935 he became the Director of the newly organized UST College of Architecture and Fine Arts.
Edades from this perch continued to promote the cause of modern art in the Philippines. He was the foremost leader of the Thirteen Moderns, launched together with Carlos Francisco and Galo Ocampo, in 1937. Under Edades’ leadership, Philippine Modernism carried on as a dynamic counterpoint to Amorsolo-style realism and naturalism.
Besides the 1976 National Artist of the Philippines award, Edades received various honors, including Doctor of Fine Arts, Honoris Causa, from UST in 1977.
His 1976 award citation hailed him as “the original iconoclast of Philippine art,” observing that “he changed the direction of Philippine painting decisively, ending the parochial isolation of Philippine art and placing it in the mainstream of international culture.”
Upon retirement in 1966, he began teaching at the Philippine Women’s College of Davao and continued to produce fine art.
Edades represents a watershed in the Philippine visual arts, “The Builders” its vanguard banner.
 |
| The Builders (1928) by Victorio Edades |
Galo B. Ocampo (1913-1985) is one of the pioneers of Philippine Modernism. Together with Victorio C. Edades and Carlos V. Francisco, he led the Thirteen Moderns, the first wave of Philippine modernists, constituted in 1937.
“Brown Madonna” (1938) illustrates well Ocampo’s Post-Impressionist style. It is a “Gauguinesque” painting that may have been inspired by Paul Gauguin’s “Ia Orana Maria” (1891), which the French émigré executed soon after settling in Tahiti. Ocampo’s painting, like “Ia Orana Maria,” is predominantly two-dimensional, besides floral, decorative, and rendered in tropical colors.
Ocampo significantly diverged from Spanish colonial religious art when he showed the Blessed Virgin Mary and Child as Malays, not Europeans. The rendition was novel at the time.
The painting shows damage where small strips have fallen off, especially visible in the skirt of the Virgin. A recent photo from the UST Museum Collection reveals that the damage has been restored.
Ocampo evolved as a painter. He launched into Surrealism following the shock and trauma of World War II.
 |
| Brown Madonna (1938) by Galo Ocampo |
 |
| Restored, UST Museum Collection |
“Jeepneys” (1951) by Vicente S. Manansala shows the 1981 National Artist of the Philippines for Visual Arts-Painting (posthumous) coming into his own. Although Manansala was an original member of the 1937 Thirteen Moderns, it was only after having survived World War II that he effectively begins his transformative journey.
“Jeepneys” is a critical step, showing the major influence of Cubism, with its geometrically based deconstructionism. Belts and patches of color switch in and out in the painterly execution of this early work. The masterpiece heralds transparent cubism, the artist’s mature and signature style.
There are somewhat inaccurately colored reproductions of this painting available on the internet. Colors shown here are probably closer to the actual, which is apparent from the photo below of the artwork displayed in the Ateneo Art Gallery.
 |
| Jeepneys (1951) by Vicente Manansala |
 |
| “Jeepneys” at the Ateneo Art Gallery |
Jose T. Joya (1931-1995) is the 2003 National Artist of the Philippines for Visual Arts-Painting (posthumous). He pioneered Abstract Expressionism in the Philippines, and more importantly, translated the style according to a recognizably Philippine idiom. His abstracts are intelligent and innovative; bold, assertive, and masculine. Bright and exuberant, they celebrate color, often warm.
It is unfortunate that he like several other important Philippine artists received his award posthumously, but it is just as well that the Philippine government eventually came around to awarding the man and his work.
 |
| Flight (1962) by Jose Joya |
Original member of the Thirteen Moderns founded in 1937, Cesar T. Legaspi (1917-1994) worked as a commercial artist until his retirement in 1968. Throughout the forties and fifties until the late sixties the first phase of his fine art could be described as Cubist works of social commentary about the economic hardship and poverty endemic in urban Philippines. His paintings from this period were, appropriately, dark. Already the artist displayed interest in modeling male musculature.
Beginning in the late sixties, he developed his own personal, meticulous and refined style of Transparent Cubism to dazzling effect. His principal subject, the male nude, he limned linearly in overlapping painstakingly diaphanous, interiorly lit planes. His style evinced a highly developed aestheticism. He is the 1990 National Artist of the Philippines for Visual Arts-Painting.
 |
| The Survivor (1972) by Cesar Legaspi |
Comments
Post a Comment