Ramona Rivera
This August, Ateneo Art Gallery celebrates its 50th year as the country’s first modern art museum. What began as a donation of select artworks from artist Fernando Zobel in 1960 has evolved into quite a significant permanent collection of modern and contemporary Philippine art. Among over 200 pieces that Mr. Zobel bequeathed to the university are works by the country’s top modernists and avant-garde artists such as Vicente Manannsala, H.R. Ocampo, Cesar Legaspi, Anita Magsaysay-Ho, David Medalla, Roberto Chabet, Aturo Luz, and Napoleon Abueva.
In the spirit of Mr. Zobel’s pioneering efforts in advancing Philippine art, the Ateneo Art Gallery initiated in 2004 the first Ateneo Art Awards. The annual award is given to Filipino artists aged 35 and below in recognition of their outstanding work for the past twelve months. Among those who have received the Award are Geraldine Javier, Jayson Oliveria and Louie Cordero (2004); Ronald Ventura, Eric Zamuco and Annie Cabigting (2005); Poklong Anading (2006 & 2008), Mideo Cruz and Maya Muñoz (2006); Lyle Buencamino, Wawi Navarozza and MM Yu (2007); Kawayan De Guia and Marina Cruz (2008); and Patricia Eustaquio, Leeroy New and Kiri Lluch-Dalena (2009).
This year’s round –up with the theme, ‘Shattering States’, aims to “traverse the range and scale of art practice, and actively underscore the transgressions being carried out by artists rather than being an evocation of stasis or permanence. Ceaselessly challenging traditional media forms, this year presents an explosive gamut of artists whose codified works in one way or another hybridize manifestations that delineate and define the cutting edge.” Without a doubt these are good things to aspire for.
Over a hundred nominations were received this year from artists, gallery owners, curators, writers, academics, and previous winners and members of the jury of the Ateneo Art Awards. The twelve artists who made it to the short-list for this year’s Award are: Frankie Callaghan, Joey Cobcobo, Kiri Dalena, Leslie De Chavez, Kawayan De Guia, Patricia Eustaquio, Riel Hilario, Pow Martinez, Leeroy New, Mark Salvatus, Michelline Syjuco, and Rodel Tapaya.
They were selected by this year’s panel composed of Ramon E.S. Lerma (Director and Chief Curator, Ateneo Art Gallery), Fr. Rene Javellana, SJ (Associate Professor, Fine Arts Program, Ateneo de Manila University), Ma. Victoria Herrera (Independent Curator and Assistant Professor, University of the Philippines, Diliman), Trickie Lopa (Art Collector and Blogger), Dannie Alvarez (Museum Administrator, Yuchengco Museum), Nick Simonovic (Managing Director, Gagosian Gallery), Carlo Tadiar (Editor-in-Chief, Metro Home), Charlie Co (Visual artist), and Judy Freya Sibayan (Artist and Assistant Professor, De La Salle University).
Last August 12 at the Grand Atrium of the EDSA Shangri-la Plaza Mall, the three winners of this year’s Awards were announced: Pow Martinez, Leslie De Chavez and Mark Salvatus. Mr. Salvatus, who was first short-listed for the Award in 2008, is lucky this year, bagging two of the art residencies that come with the Awards. Apart from a cash prize, he will participate in the residency at the Common Room Networks Foundation in Bandung, Indonesia and the La Trobe University Art Center in Bendigo, Australia. Recipients of the residencies at Artesan Gallery & Studio in Singapore and a three-week, all-expense paid stay at the Art OMI in upstate New York courtesy of Ateneo Society member and art collector Marcel Crespo have yet to be declared.
Mr. Salvatus was chosen for his work ‘Secret Garden’, which was included in the exhibition Sungduan 5: Daloy ng Dunong at the National Museum last September 30 – November 15, 2009. Inspired by a tale of prisoners at the Quezon Provincial Jail who created a secret vegetable garden in their cell, Mr. Salvatus made an installation using fake plants made by the prisoners themselves out of recycled plastic bottles, and on an adjacent wall, a sticker based on the tattoo of a snarling tiger, which is the emblem of one of the gangs in the prison. While the work appeals to those with socio-political inclinations, the backstory is more interesting than the actual work, a weak installation of glossy decals and wishful decorations.
Leslie De Chavez’ exhibition Buntong Hininga at Silverlens and SLab last April 22 – May 2, 2010, is another re-working of tired social realist themes. His overpriced, large, round shaped canvasses with those dark, awfully colored, ghoulish figures speak of the same old topics, stale news like corruption, poverty, and political scandals, as if that’s all there is to the Philippine landscape. But the rich and the foreigners love it. They like to romanticize the grief and squalor of the poor masses in Third World countries. Which probably accounts for Mr. De Chavez’ shows in Seoul, Beijing and Zurich, and a well trumped up show at Silverlens and SLab, his first in Manila since 2003.
Pow Martinez’ 1 Billion Years shown at West Gallery last June 4 – July 6, 2009, is the dark horse in the group. He has no grand statements about art and Philippine politics. He doesn’t really care about what he’s painting and how he’s going to paint it. He just enjoys slathering paint, mostly directly from the tube, onto his canvas, creating images that are at once naïve, absurd, and sometimes horrific. While his paintings have a refreshing raw intensity and corporeality, his earlier and less popular conceptual works in sound and installation were more thought – provoking and trippy.
While the Ateneo Art Award has undeniably spurned the public’s attention towards the work of young Filipino artists and contemporary art in general, it is facing a lot of criticism. Out of the 12 artists in this year’s shortlist, more than half are repeat nominees and winners. Many people are saying, what is so shattering about this list, when majority of the artists included are so last year? Though some maybe catchy, nothing is groundbreaking or entirely new about their work. If there’s anything remotely close to being shattering, it’s the record prices that their works command in recent sales and auctions.
The conservative dictates of the art market are so evident in this selection made by a jury that usually includes collectors, gallery owners, and other members with possible conflicts of interests. It is becoming a popularity contest based on market standards rather than a real pursuit of aesthetic transgressions in today’s art. Many of the jury members have not even seen the actual exhibitions and base their selection on a presentation made by the artists who have to inconveniently re-mount their works. For artists who made site-specific or temporal works, the jury has to make do with the documentation, which sometimes can never really fully capture and translate the nuances and particularities of certain types of works. This is an extra burden on the artists, many of whom have no savvy presentation skills or couldn’t care less about such demonstrations. It also seems unfair and questionable that an artist’s single work in a group exhibition is taken with the same consideration as a solo exhibition, or an entire body of work. Also flawed is the fact that one artist can hog all the residencies, or be short-listed for more than one exhibition. Surely, there are other worthy artists out there who deserve the recognition. But they are probably over 35.
The Philippine art scene today is marked by a growing excess and frivolity. Never before have we had this kind of spectacle. Art aside, the Ateneo Art Awards is a true-blue high – society event where so much is spent on the pageantry, the over-designed invitations and catalogues, dinners and cocktails. If this money was channeled into acquiring the works of the winners, then it would have been a more meaningful way to support the artists and build a museum collection at the same time, instead of waiting for donations or works on loan from other collectors. A museum’s main business is the building, housing and caring for a collection of historically important works so that current and future generations can experience, learn and understand art. This was the reason why Fernando Zobel donated his collection, and the Ateneo Art Gallery must always remember this.
(The 2010 Ateneo Art Awards: “Shattering States” exhibition is on view at the Grand Atrium of the EDSA Shangri-la Plaza Mall until August 16, 2010. It will then move to the Ateneo Art Gallery, from August 25 – October 2, 2010)
