Toti Cerda and Erwin Mallari: Keeping the Faith

BY JAY BAUTISTA |

Master visual artist Toti Cerda and watercolorist Erwin Mallari were both born, bred and continue to dwell in their respective hometowns near the proximity to the metropolitan center. As significant contemporary artists they have bear witnessed to the radical change of progress in these dwellings evolving from once being idyllic and pristine locations to the ever bustling these localities are today.

Cerda, who was born in Talim Island near Binangonan, saw how in the last 30 years the lakeshore towns of Rizal have evolved the fishing enclaves and farming villages being partitioned into the commercial districts and residential subdivisions at present.

Na-Amorsolo II by Toti Cerda

Mallari grew up in Malabon when it was still a fishing hub in Rizal until the 70s and observed when it separated and became part of Metro Manila. Fishing still remains a major source of livelihood in the area because of the interconnected of its river system. This development attracted people to reside in its low lying flat terrains making Malabon densely populated through that it floods and have worsened in recent years. It constantly becoming submerged in water most of the time, as it became known.

Foot Bridge (c4 Malabon) by Erwin Mallari

In Paghilom, Cerda and Mallari have meticulously documented the visual changes in their beloved abodes and the surrounding setting around them that are fast changing. More than just putting their thoughts on their canvases and papers, they have however kept the faith in their beloved places of origin and remain hopeful that there is still a light at the end of this ongoing pandemic situation--as seen through the affirmative outlook of these recent works.

Cerda, of late pays homage to Philippine masters, and continuous to do so in rigid manner. He has honored the great 19^th century realist Juan Luna and the poet of the palette in Carlos “Botong” Francisco in his previous outputs. In Paghilom, he highlights the master of folk genre in our first National Artist, Fernando Amorosolo, appropriating his hardworking farmers in the rice fields and women fetching water in clay pots. He churns out the gray and burgeoning factories as backdrops to Amorsolo’s colorful rural scenes as Cerda saw how rapid industrialization has slowly sprouted in vast expanse of his adopted region.

Paghilom is Cerda’s direct in-your-face clamor in support to agriculture for our own food sustenance and basic survival mode to the future. He expresses the quaint predominant metaphors of Amorsolo such as sturdy farmers toiling the soil and the beautiful provincial lasses cooking their meals against the solid concrete of gravel and the hustle of building economies as featured setting. Cerda has effected an experimental illustrative handle by using the soft yet distinct subjects of Amorsolos’s period evocations against a social realist and urban tableau. Cerda’s remains confident yet sensitive in these brushstrokes in adhering to Amorsolo’s masterpieces by inducing Cerda’s promising visual language and in finding new approaches to realism in painting. The result is a dramatic theater in paints.

Banga ni Amorsolo by Toti Cerda

In his previous life, Mallari was once part of the commuter life having to endure two hour bus rides from Malabon to Pasig where he used to work as a graphic designer. In Paghilom, he mends his old and tiring ways and heals from the painful remembrances caused by impatience to get a ride, inhaling smog caused by a polluted volume of transportation vehicles resulting into a perennial traffic. As a fine watercolorist, there is a certain charm when the colors and the tones of a scene is captured in watercolor. Even how Mallari renders the red lights from the bumper-to-to-bumper of cars has a certain romance when evocatively painted and hanged on the wall.

Meaningful to Mallari are the LRT 1 stations like Roosevelt, Balintawak and 5^th Avenue which he is most familiar with and accustomed to its related commuter ordeal. He also favors bridges while doing his rounds documenting them for posterity. The Bitbit and Centennial Bridges and the Foot Bridge (Malabon) are prominently featured in this exhibiton. Mallari even finds beauty in the chaos in construction with faulty wires of electric posts included. There is relief for him in getting from where you came from to your point of destination. For Mallari that is progress of life and the joy is in the journey. Sometimes he who dabbled into photography, takes a photos and in framing his images translates them on larger watercolor paper when he gets home.

Bonifacio (Caloocan) by Erwin Mallari

These days Mallari advocates a return to riding bicycles as a means of transportation to ease traffic as he once had to endure it on a daily basis. His regimen now he become a city chronicler who goes around, with art materials in tow, documenting these memorable moments and secrets corners that he fancies along his bicycle routes around the metropolis.

Mallari is a constant fixture in the streets as he documents spaces by opting to paint outdoors (plein air as the French impressionists popularized it in the 19^th century). While making his rounds he stops at a beautiful site that captures his eye and puts out his paper on boards and attempts to catch the fleeting moment. He hurriedly sketches them as he wets his paints and renders them in his desired compositions. He has special fond experiences with every piece he creates from bystanders as he prefers painting daily scenes of ordinary life on the spot.

Sometimes Mallari escapes from the city, immersing himself in rural landscapes such as Dingalan (in Aurora) and Alcala in Cagayan. Here he basks in its pristine sunlight and unfiltered air to recharge his artistic soul. Providing rest for the eyes, he know a lot of desperate people long for these framed painterly accents for as city folks many are trapped in the current quagmire of our urban jungles.

Paghilom is both a celebration to the city life as it stresses the value of spontaneity, appropriation and relevance in their artistic pieces, as most paintings even establish inherent tension and issues. They may not be commercially-eye candy pieces but in their subtlety or even harshness that convey the sense of wonder in the painters’ free reign of imagery and meaning. Depending how one would come to view the collective significance of these two artists, they are both positive in their creative output--that is all that matters.

Bukid ni Amorsolo by Toti Cerda

Unfazed by the possibilities of media, mixing three or more coats of paint is still the proposed materiality, whether it be acrylic or watercolor, be it done in reverse or even traversing the creative process. Cerda’s brand of realism has always constricted and countered the traditional visual styles of his forebears for it to redefine itself into new actualities of his own right. Often rejecting the banal and sacred, it defies fixation with the tested norm. Mallari, on the other hand, wants to hone his watercolor skills through strict discipline and mood. Despite it being the most difficult medium to handle among artists, he prefers the fresh perspectives and evocative expressions it imparts. Even as Cerda and Mallari are open to more raw approaches to art, both still value that paintings should be created for its social function and not lost for its own sake.

Bitbit Bridge (Narzagaray) by Erwin Mallari

PAGHILOM is ongoing at the Galerie Anna, Bldg. A, SM Megamall, Mandaluyong City.

Otto Neri: Yesterday Once More

BY JAY BAUTISTA |

In keeping up with his bespoke visual style of juxtaposing the historical with contemporary iconographies, Otto Neri becomes more personal for this exhibition Jukebox, as he merges two of his prime obsessions--Philippine art history and popular music.

Hey Jude, Come Together

Being both a self-taught painter and musician for more than half of his creative life, Neri happily grew up in a realist neighborhood of Caloocan where he was honed as the willing apprentice by senior Mabini artists. With paint brushes in tow, priming their every canvas at any particular day of the week. All the while listening to the music of the bygone years spanning at least 30 years would naturally be heard in Neri’s entire household even extending in the midst of their neighborhood ambience.

Moonriver

Through all those years, Neri listened intently, imbibing the smooth crooning of Frank Sinatra, the blaring trumpet of Louis Armstrong, the yeah, yeah, yeah of the Beatles by heart, even backsliding to the danceable steps of the elevating moves of a gyrating Michael Jackson. The strength of these pieces is evident on how Neri is well-versed with the musicality of these tunes that even their respective memorized lyrics were literally coming out of his ears as he was painting these masterpieces. It was in the silence of the ongoing community quarantine that he heard them all at their loudest.

In Jukebox, Neri relied heavily on nostalgia as he deeply reminisced his own memories when life was plain simple and grossly fun. It is in remembering one’s significant past that we lighten up and learn a value or two. Suddenly through Neri’s paintings we are transported back in time when we first heard these songs and remember that first kiss, that first dance, how we felt alive and who we chose to be with. Neri was in his usual being as an artistic provocateur, with his own visual language bordering on irreverence and humor. His appreciation for beauty is boundless as his sense of composition is organic and not theorized by any rules in art school or movement. Think of free form jazz in a kundiman overture.

In Come Together Neri situates “the most written about, the most listened to and the most imitated” band in the world staging a performance before rural folk in an idyllic Amorosolo-inspired setting. An obvious and even oblivious ode to the National Artist as he was always been an influence to Neri.

Another Amorsolo appropriated scene is replicated in Billie Jean. This time Michael Jackson is joined by the seductive Marilyn Monroe while entertaining in front of the people celebrating along the church patio in what seem like a Fiesta revelry.

In merging pop icons in Philippine landscapes, some are familiar and other actual places he frequents, Neri has gone bold and more whimsical with his images. He always borders his “what-ifs” with an impactful pun intended to the situation. Admittedly, there were many artists who also induced popular culture in the visual arts yet it is only Neri who upgrades the discipline by using Philippine culture as soundboard for a primer. He explores our identity rooted in postcolonial jab in brushstrokes while retaining a painterly jest and light-spirited.

Neri highlights that Filipinos are music lovers and songs have a way of remembering the milestones in our lives. These soundtracks are deeply embedded in our heritage and in honoring these memories Neri paints them with layers of influence. He even titles them in accordance to the titles of the songs themselves.

Marilyn Monroe, representing Hollywood glitter and the imperial beauty of the Blonde, has been a recurring fixture in Neri’s past shows, in All About Eve makes another appearance. This time in front of the native tribesmen. A strong nationalist sentiment that will not go away. Neri admits we are immersed with popular culture by sentimentality that it overshadows the indigenous inherent in us.

Neri is an old soul trapped in a modernist body. He watches old films and favors to listen to old songs in his spare time. He even wears a fedora hat as part of his overall packaging. While watching these films or coming across a memorable image, it completely overwhelms him. It is the image that speaks to him. At the right time comes, when there will be an accumulation of images, Neri will remember it and compose his elements around this main subject.

Moonriver is Neri’s take from what was the theme song of the film Breakfast at Tiffany’s. This piece features Audrey Hepburn on top of the moon, together with an amalgam of personalities highlighted by General Antonio Luna with roses. Louis Armstrong makes a cameo role serenading what is supposed to be a romantic elopement between two diverse icons.

Billie Jean

Reshuffling history, popular culture, and the contemporary is Neri’s preoccupation with new world order on canvas. Mind you, he is not preachy, he just proposes you with an inquiry towards our identity and politics in an impasto textured manner. Through Neri’s paintings he wanted the viewer to reminisce what he was and how far we have become since he heard these songs. Then maybe we will feel good about ourselves for a while especially there is still no vaccine for the virus in site. Despacito is Neri’s reaction that we will survive this quagmire. Reminiscent of how we surpassed the Spanish influenza during the early 20^th century, the current pandemic may even unite us as we heal in unison.

Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable. Everyone can identify with this Louis Armstrong classic What a Wonderful World as it contemplates on the grievous mishaps that happened in our midst—that the coronavirus has altered the way we live and prioritized what is significant and meaningful in our lives, in the end it still is a life worth living.

All About Eve

Just Another Woman In Love provides a light banter of a situation wherein a gambler got enticed in a squalor. As he was about to send money to his wife, he was lured to betting for a red rooster only to lose in the end. The red here not only symbolizes love but also of fury when the wife fumed mad at the wasted situation and opportunity.

Jukebox seeks to return to the past not just for the sake of memorable longing for what has been lost but as a presentation of a story of the Filipino that has since evolved and emancipated. In so doing Neri takes the plight of musicians most of whom do not have a record label anymore. All can be heard on Spotify or any digital platform, at a time when record collecting is making a comeback. My Way is self-reflective in a way that if we want change it should start with us—as depicted in the road leading back to where it began: you.

Don't Stop Me Now

Don’t Stop Me Now finds Freddie Mercury with The Beatles crossing along the busiest intersections in Antipolo. It is that junction where Neri frequents while doing his errands and going to the market. Similar to this is that Neri is now at his own crossroad as a mid-career artist that he longs for relevance. He is always on the lookout for new ways of seeing that will speak the times. That one can appreciate contemporary Philippine art while viewing rock and roll on canvas.

Ricky Ambagan: Pulling the String to a Full Stop

JAY BAUTISTA|

I'm Coming Home

The increasing pressure to phase out our beloved jeepneys from the main thoroughfares of Manila (and Baguio) where they once ruled is surmounting by the day. The government says they don’t even physically fit any more—an unpleasant sight--a stumbling block to progress; that their sheer volume has become a liability even as commuters cramp them up every early morning filling up their maximum sitting capacity.

This is where visual artist Ricky Ambagan pulls the string to a full stop. Paying homage to the Patok, a parlance for the last of the rogue jeepneys, Ambagan has kept the faith for these most enduring Pinoy icons. Patok is a sub-species of jeepneys plying from Montalban or Cogeo via Marcos Hi-way. Bigger than the usual 16-seater capacity, they have been built for one sole reason for being--speed; most are candy-colored and heavily decorated using airbrush. 

Basang Basa sa Ulan

With young and restless drivers at the helm, Patok travels you in hasty, topsy-turvy-style, often arriving at your destination in record time. They take you to Montalban—like in a drag race--in the shortest time possible–even that claim is an understatement. They too are notoriously loud for their music.

Patok:Ang Pagbabalik ng Langgam is an ode--a narration of the travesties and intricacies of the last days of the jeepney. A roving telenovela--as Ambagan likes to call it--because we are a reflection of the kind of transportation we get into.

Other jeepneys today are barer for its practicality but the Patok are praised both for their functionality and aesthetics. What was once a war surplus and replacement for jitneys (thus the name) became a rolling showcase of our folk artistry. The jeepney became an extension of a driver’s humble abode: how he extends an altar in his dashboard complete with vigil bulbs; how he adorns its ceiling with copied paintings from masters, alongside names of his loved ones; how he uses curtains to ward of dust and keep ventilation for a smooth and safe trip.

Ambagan does not capture all their dirt and grime but seats in front as a hopeless sentimentalist, tempering that in-your-face rap music with jingly-jangly chords, even acoustics of the heart. In I’m Coming Home he sets the mood how the ever-dependable jeepney will always be there by remaining available 24/7. No matter how late —the graveyard shifters, the overworking employees, clandestine lovers unaware of their stolen moments, the sordid drunk coming from revelry—all depend on the jeepney to get safely home. Composing the picture Ambagan shows how lonely the crusade and uphill battle they now face. Yet the stars are out in full support for their cause.    

Basang basa sa Ulan implies in you an uncomfortable situation and captures another practicality of the Patok--how it is to survive without being drenched in the rain. Ambagan’s brilliance gears up when he juxtaposes his subjects along with the title of the most popular Aegis song. He resembles it how it is being soaked—both in our bodies and feelings—from the July showers evokes discomfort yet nostalgia; how art and music blend well in a painting. Ambagan has been there, done that.

Come Together

Come Together reprises that inviting Beatles song with the pedestrian as trigger word linking the famous fab four crossing through Abbey Road. Notice Ambagan suits his images with whatever his idea he had in mind. No photos as reference but imagination and how emotions play when that song was first played. Reminds one of the good times, as we flash back reminding the soundtrack of our lives.

The Jeep of Medusa

They may not be as comfortable as it was then but a Patok experience is on the extreme in riding dangerously, so to speak. Ambagan observes how these accents and accessorizes daily living. Each Patok jeepney is a wandering statement, its character emits from the graffiti’s they espouse, as well as the sentimentality of the music it pipes in. Ambagan laments that the day would come they will just end up in glass cases enclosed in a cold museum for viewing purposes only.

The Jeep of Medusa is an astoundingly haunting sepia, pencil, and charcoal on canvas. Against the colorful palette is this centerpiece discussing the plight of the jeepney. Opposed to the desperate survivors of the shipwreck as Louis Andre Theodore Gericault depicted his masterpiece, Ambagan took off with liberation and breaking free from human frailty and futility.

Folk religiosity has been a recurring subject for Amabagan. Lord Patawad remains a subliminal in its message. He has committed to his creative passion but more faithful to his God. Finding Pepe reflects Ambagan’s nationalist fervor. Here he situates Jose Rizal as a lowly passenger among the throng, busily absorbed in reading today’s news. Affected by the goings on with our current state of affairs. Ambagan hints we may be giving up our values for less mundane and superficial things.    

Finding Pepe

The subtitle Ang Pagbabalik ng Langgam reminisces Ambagan’s previous exhibitions which featured multiple of people en mass be it in Manila, downtown Baguio or flooded Malabon. His style of distortion, marked up by raw and coarse brushstrokes, endeared in humor and memory are the hallmark of his visual style. How he angles his canvases, twisting and twirling his subjects convoluting the kind of complex quagmire they are into. Not veering desperation rather he counters perspectives that would find meaning to whatever longing that may come along their way. His colors burst with bravura often engaging even provoking the viewer as a call to action and not passively observe.

Filipino artist worth his salt had a take on the jeepney. Vicente Manansala focused on its aesthetics as a folk art; Cesar Legaspi probed on its definite lines and earth-toned hues; Mauro Malang’s jeepneys appealed like general postcards to the tourists; Manny Garibay focused on their interior jeepneys being a socialist stage, the happenings inside while in transit. Ambagan is anecdotal highlighting the stories behind his paintings that make you stare long and hard, whether you empathize, amused or baffled at the drama behind it. How scenes elicit a smirk is what inspired him to feature this. Ambagan nonchalantly contributes to the contending dynamics of our culture and a deeper encouragement that the Pinoy will survive whatever that comes his way. 

Lord Patawad

With the clock ticking, though jeepneys may still be the preferred informal mode of transportation of the general publics, however like terminally-ill cancer patients, they are now living on borrowed time.

In Patok Ambagan honors the jeepney one last time while it is still breathing, fighting for its life. He parallels the existence of the jeep with the timeline of our country—too crowded, rowdy--with every passenger has a preferred direction to take. Everything that is happening in us—be it political, entertaining or poverty reflected--revolves around the goings-on of the jeepney, as one takes a collective ride. In the end, Ambagan is just an artist who commutes.

Ricky Ambagan: Bookmarks

BY JAY BAUTISTA |
(for Gabriel Garcia Marquez 1927-2014)

Very few Filipino artists figure prominently in as many national art competitions and still produce a distinct body of work as they eventually mature in their foregoing artistic careers. In Here Comes the Sun Ricky Ambagan revisits his past visual triumphs while traversing in new realms of visual dialogues. Thematically tempered by books, these bundled pages in between covers, some pieces personally essay like art journals in coded languages while others become more social in their current pronouncements. Transforming these near-obsolete tomes into stages of conflicts, each layer in the bookshelves serves as a arena of issues, possibilities and realizations.

While growing up Ambagan reminisces being impressed by the presence of encyclopedia volumes as semantics of affluence upon inhabiting the private spaces of his friends’ homes. Books would become his acclaimed prerequisite as one acquires a certain taste in lifestyle reflecting one’s stature in society.

In his famous essay Unpacking My Library critic and intellectual Walter Benjamin sought the dialectical in the function of books. Aside from the pleasure of actively squinting of one’s eyes in between lines, books aid to alleviate in the rudiments of writing creatively or exhibiting the obvious upon viewers its collective decorative interface.

Shadow of Wisdom, 2014

Acquiring of books has become status events as recent auctions prove more collectors purchase books in lots for the sheer aesthetics they project. Shadow of Wisdom is a solitary testimony of the long and short argument of the demise and eventual futility of books being read. As our digital age challenges its impending existence, devoid of emotion this lone advocate remains steadfast as it puts up a last defiant stand against the fading of this old world reminder. An unread book on a shelf is a marker of a better time spent than reading it, of the time your mind wonder that there are greater minds than yours and a book is a tribute to that achievement.

Let It Go, 2014

Although stark in depiction, Let It Go looks forward to the blue horizon of how books will matter to the next generation. Shelf life is the difference between actual books and electronic kind, and this cannot replace the romance of turning its original pulp and be engrossed by it. A reprisal of Ambagan’s winning piece in the GSIS National Painting Competition in 2011, books remind us of what we know and more of what we don’t know, that a people is as progressive as the gathering illumination of knowledge will liberate them. Ambagan’s depiction of light emanating from many sources represented with the flight of lanterns inspires as it enthrals our responsibility to initiate our own spark for the literacy of others.

We Will Rise uplifts the prevalent gloom wrought from last year’s fortuitous disasters, setback in sports and political and spiritual dilemmas. We see an amalgam of contemporary personalities who were in the news from an embattled boxer Manny Pacquiao to an auspicious Pope Benedict to dignified yet still hopeful Yolanda victims. With a pieta scene looming in the centerpiece imbibing compassion, each section of the shelves are like cubicles of status updates of what is happening in our midst. Ambagan’s pieces can be read as alamanac for the year that was. Emphatically composed, his play of images are whimsical as the graphic device involving shelves can be viewed as small worlds in themselves. 

We Will Rise, 2014

Kilometer Zero, 2014

Kilometer Zero exudes sentimentality as Amabagan recalls another favored recognition in a national art competition five years, this time for a government metro train system. He wanted to duplicate this work for himself as it has brought him commercial and critical success. Using distortion as a visual style, Ambagan has captured in astrayed brushtrokes the actuated motion of an MRT train. Ambagan himself is witnessed with his son in the forefront of this frame which is on top of a shelf contextualizing that this is an afterthought, a remake of his devotion to familial love and ode to his initial struggle as an artist. 

Reflective of Ambagan being well-versed in visual communications, Boom! captures the drama of what goes in the divergent minds of advertising people in a normal brainstorming session.  Second to nature they debate regularly on their concepts and progression of ideas. Seems surreal as a plethora of conniving yet contrarian in characters like vintage airplanes, Van Gogh biography, the ever-present Albert Einstein, a gallant Napoleon Bonaparte even the Beatles subliminally float like a multiple of presents. Allegorically driven by performance as seen in the platform diver, it is not necessary a pretty image as this diptych seems to be. Comical bombs contrasts as they immediately tones down all half-baked solutions adding texture to the overall picture.

Boom! 2014

Ambagan’s recent works stare back as they remind you why we are attracted to art in the first place. Here Comes the Sun may also mean temporary respite, as Ambagan continues to experiment from his tried and tested, raw and rough brushstrokes to thinner but more definite layers grounded in earth color palette.  From featuring throngs of people in the metropolis and Baguio City, whether they are in pedicabs or part of the desperate multitude earning their keep, he shifts to more upscale ambience, more ethereal in iconography.  

Here Comes the Sun has always been a song of redemption as it is relevant now for Ambagan. There’s an anecdote that as the Beatles were finishing Abbey Road, its last album before eventually breaking up, its composer George Harrison was avoiding the other members of his band. And the phrase "here comes the sun" was how he really felt every day when the day's recording session was over. At his prime, Ambagan churned out these pieces were as comforting as Harrison’s but as essential as his subject matter—books. It is also scorching welcome to that intense season of the year and to the many passionate things we associate it with -- summer.

Here Comes the Sun is Ricky V. Ambagan’s 5^th Solo Exhibition. Ongoing until May 6 at the Galerie Anna, 4/F Art Walk, SM Megamall, Mandaluyong City.

Ramel Villas is Homegrown

BY JAY BAUTISTA |

The long yet evocative history of Philippine art is replete with self-taught artists who have been struggling hard to be identified. They feel they can be creative enough and endowed with the same working hands to fill up a canvas or two. Not since becoming the first apprentices who assisted the masters in depicting murals in churches and public buildings have they emerged from a more practical need as they could not afford or were excluded from the formal fine art schools since the early 19^th century. This probably explains why most of our earliest surviving religious and genre paintings and portraits from this period were standardly unsigned. They remain admired yet unrecognized to this day. Aesthetically, there seems to be a folk-like style in terms of how they freely compose their images from imagination, something unobtrusive with how they compose their subjects.

One such painter is Angono-based painter Ramel Villas. Although very much of what he knows is similar to visual oiuido, the art of Villas displays unrefined yet lush imagination. He proudly confesses he does not suffer from any lack of self-esteem or does not longs for the company for other artists brought about by his lack of a fine arts diploma. Even in Angono where he is based, in this highly artistic small town of Botong Francisco with a living school of more self-taught artists inspired by his apprentices, Villas still remains an outsider. Never mind it was just a mere coincidence that the Villas had decided to find a studio there for his art practice.  

The Novelist, Oil on Canvas 48 x 36 inches, 2012

Fond of that sentimental old world charm, it was that endangered yet functional typewriter, smacked right on an intense man’s head in The Novelist that got me interested to write about Villas. How this haggard-looking mustached man with his bloodshot eyes contemplates the viewer, compelling him to stare some more in the process. One immediately notices the rough texture of Villas’ brushstrokes, devoid of any of that Photoshop application commonly used these fast paced days. The viewer is further drawn deeper to his playground of metaphors: how Villas hands you the perspective, leaving you how to come up with your own version of such hopscotch narrative. A unicorn evoking attention while a castle of a bygone era looms. Given their desperate stance are the lovers who are about to part ways? And with time against their side, the option to escape as imposed by the hot air balloon remains to be the only spurious option. Their only moment is now.

More than decorative in intent, Villas uses symbols so well, functioning like some guide you that hint as how to conjure up with your perspective of the story. 

Mr. Brightside, Oil on Canvas, 48 x 36 inches, 2012

Art writer Philip Paraan who wrote on Villas one-man exhibition at the Galerie Anna (where most of these pieces were hanged) commented that these artworks “as vessels of thought, his paintings evoke hope and the intention to find beauty and harmony in chaos. This artist has been known to paint lush and detailed compositions, at times remarked to be even too detailed if not lacking focus or what others would say, an image overload. But such is the visual gambit that Villas embraces, to achieve a dynamic spread and dispersion in unity where all elements can be focal at any given time.”   

Mr. Brightside seems to be the perfect painting for this season of joy and hope. In fact Villas volunteers to infect you with his luminous message of positivity. Villas adds: Clear sight, happy inside, I am Mr. Bright side. Part of my process is to just keep painting as my thoughts flash with images from dreams. With the smiling face with a butterfly for an eye in front of you one explores various icons that is close to the subject matter i wanted. It is like connecting to the audience, like surprising 
someone by showing your face.

  

Feria, Oil on Canvas.48 x 36 inches, 2013 

Placing third at the Art Association of the Philippines National Art Competition in 2009 made Villas decide to be a full-time painter. He was also finalist in this year’s Tanaw: Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas National Painting Competition with his work Feria (Latin for "free day").

Feria, as part of the fiesta, is his tribute to this dying culture of honoring the patron saints of towns. Villas realized: art as a wonderful blessing that is delightful to share. I might say that I'm just telling stories in a visual manner however I'm not a preacher. All I want for people is to see my stories. It will be a delight if people will find something essential in my works.

Oftalmologo is an example of that he has what comprises as “three stars and the sun” sentiment. Having some sense of history induced in this piece while displaying his usual take at various levels of interpretations. A wall-bound Jose Rizal field trip if you may, everything you need to know in a capsule: The feathered plume with his writings, the crocodile reference in his novel El Filibusterismo, the soup heater (not lamp as others claim) where his Huling Paalam was safely kept, the love of his life. As an ophthalmologist, he is also a figurative seer of our nation’s future. On this day of his martyrdom, Villas piece philosophically asks where are we in seeing the vision of what Rizal saw.

Like a reverend soul trapped in a 31 year old body, Villas who is the eldest in a brood of five from Quezon province, considers his depictions to be his longings. The layered images on top his main subjects are “his thoughts out loud.” He volunteers to add: I will always wonder about works of Juan Luna and Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo. Magic comes in appearance of daubs and slashes of paints in raw, loaded with emotions. In painting manner I'm respect tradition. Meanwhile, Salvador Dali sparks confidence in me in letting my dreams out.

Oftalmologo, Oil on Canvas. 48 x 24 inches, 2012

Reviewing the works of Villas the science writer Philip Jose Farmer comes to my mind. Farmer had his Riverworld series where he would often interlude real personalities like Mozart, Jack London met with his fictional characters in another world. Remember this was started in the 70s thus it was political, pleasurable and personal (even Farmer was there in his stories). A critic said it was “theology, pornography in an adventure.” Think Sir Richard Burton meeting Mark Twain. Like Farmer, the possibilities are without boundaries and Villas is just warming up.

Paraan unravels some more for Villas: His emblematic game purposely rearranges, in a playful and curious way, images and themes with known and immediate references showing his penchant for jolting images with such flexibility. His canvases produce such mingling of elements and understated juxtapositions that usually transcend time and boundaries and even cultural affinities as if they refuse to stay in their domain and normal associations. With his consistent mutation of usage and context in symbols, he seems to acts against the mechanistic way of seeing and representation but in the end results in with terrific cumulative energies and awe. Like a steady flowing stream, his art he could sound the mind’s dark depths more subtly than would the overtly grotesque and disturbing juxtapositions.

Villas explains more on his process: Creating a piece is a form of meditation for me. Every work is like a journal but not all of them are my own stories, but extract of my observation. Images around are symbols. I don't consider them as support, but they are the essence and the heart of the piece. It is a challenge for me to put together symbols that most of the time people may find irrelevant and image overload. One goal in my composition is to find harmony over chaos.

In the midst of burgeoning art fairs and biennales where art concepts literally occupy spaces in a room, there seems to be a lack discourse and discussing much about two-dimensional paintings. The belief that a canvas can still sum up one’s thoughts is still startling and quite comforting. This untrained yet skillful should we say “craftsman” like Villas, whatever he lacked in acquired rudiments in the classroom, he very well make up with the forcefulness of his brushstrokes with organic originality.