Belated review of 2005

The Shows of 2005
Jayson Oliveria – Killafoto, Green Papaya, QC- too old to be mentioned, too jologs for the starbucks crowd of Katipunan or the Max Brenner denizens of Makati Avenue, too fun to install for Sir Chabet, too much like his own studio – an utterly evolving collage of stuff and scraps from previous works.

Jayson Oliveria – Attack Painter, The Drawing Room, Makati- the little heard show as it opened the year 2005. To quote Tejero on this :” ….Their combinations of khaki, yellow, umber, black, white, orange, pink, turquoise, ultramarine, ochre, red, yellow-green, slate-green, plus the crisscrossing lines and curves and jumbles of circles, squares, rectangles, triangles, stripes, polka dots – look sickly, if not downright ugly.” But as the title suggests, which do you think is being attacked?

Jet Melencio & Kreskin Sugay – Double Bluff, Future Prospects, Cubao & Mag:net, The Loop, QCThe come-back show of the scene’s most under-rated artists proving for the umpteenth time the mettle of their being first and foremost painters. Though Sugay’s having quite a slow re-start, his images remain uncompromising as with the canvas covered all over with lacquered cotton balls, tending to be blunt and corny at the same time – wit in a bottle of gin-bulag and reminiscent of the badness of the so-called Dusseldorf school. While Melencio’s is one for that dandy esotericism quite typical of most abstract works.

Poklong Anading – Anonymity, Finale Art File, Megamall- Shining example of a good work in a ‘bad venue’. Not really bad, bad but it felt quite constrained as it’s in a narrow, corridor-type room and the supposed illumination of the back-lit poster dims its aspired for brilliance.

Jed Escueta – Trace A Stasis, September. Theo Gallery, Saguijo café, Makati - Photography is starting to out painting as the décor of the boudoir, groomed to be this shore’s Pecker he is not but man what eye for such images – be it the druggy culture or the real drama confined in his home of a dad wishing him to be a titled lawyer.

Mystery Meat – group show – East coast west coast – Future Prospects
- nothing new, esp when you’re a subscriber to Juxtapoz where most of these artists are featured. Hello???!!!! we have our own homies here, yo er rather Emo kids holed up in dead end call center jobs. But I guess, those Kanos are still lucky getting paid for doing designs and all for the youth market there is very broad, diverse, you’d wonder if their subcultures are created for such purpose, y’ reckon it?

Picturing Painting. Group show. Vargas Museum. QC- one word, reworked.

Romeo Lee – Pope Lee I – Mag:net ABS CBN- he’s orginal most certainly. And fuck theory!

David Griggs - The Buko Police, Green Papaya-Like being transported to a resort, a vacation in hell, rather a purgatory, a hide-out of tourist kidnappers as there’s a hammock at the middle, coconuts transformed to jack o lanterns, a Christ figure tattooed with euphemisms in front of a camouflage drapery obscuring the way to the toilet, framed postcard size photos of “Pinoyness hoi-polloi jologs kewlness, hippie wanna-bees strumming a guitar on the Persian rug and yuppy intellectuals trying to fit in into this mess, while the artist just probably wants to head to the beach to surf or to the streets to skate. It was probably a way for Griggs to figure out why he was here in the Philippines for his artist-residency and everything just puzzles him – some are quite pissy, some are quite okay and not so different from where he’s been or probably a transfiguration betwixt a rock and a hard place ( being food poisoned in Bangkok and/or being muddled in theory by his curator here. ) I found the show genuine though, less of the SOP us-vs-them in conceptualizing art shows within a residency program.

Fragile Youth with Artificial Legs .Mariano Ching and Yasmin Sison . Theo Gallery, Saguijo café
- masked portraits of young girls vying for Lolita unwittingly
- book transformed into a landscape

Innocent When You Dream.Mariano Ching and YAsmin Sison Finale, Megamall-Hirst as a tiangge keychain, a garden set on Michael Jackson’s Thriller album
-murky landscapes where kids fly kites

(title) Group show (Nona Garcia, Geraldine Javier, Alfred Esquillo, Patricia Eustaquio, artist, Wire Tuazon). Curated by Roberto Chabet. The Art Center, Megamall- The difference between the so-called UP FA school and UST CAFA in this arena is so marked like there’ll be breakdancing any minute. One notices this most in the color scheme where the UST guys showed their penchance for sepia, ochre, burnt sienna, thus being more attuned with the “local color”, while the UP posse were being black tie, two toned, gothic Lolita in copying from photos both found and personally contrived. But Nona’s paintings of her own room being ransacked was one of the more memorable images though, as if she herself has let go much of the dogma of technique and pretty much allowed some violation of it. It was a box-office success anyway, just look at the names, there’s one for every type of collector.


Failure of Modern Man – group show ( Argee Bandoy, Vic Balanon, Ferdz Valencia), Future Prospects- The 3rd installment in the saga of the three stooges – an autistic/ savant, an agro Kafka, a peace-loving skater –man how can these three be the best of buddies? But I saw them through the years and they pretty much held up the same dynamic. Only this time, Balanon and Valencia seemed to play mere support to Bandoy who had more works in this show. There’s a nagging wonder that this may just be an excuse to bond and keep up with what’s happening. I’m being biased - I liked everything in it, well except for the altar of Jesus-Buddha-Krishna, I still don’t know how to handle religious stuff in a show. Maybe a search for a high not found in the extreme stunts ever imagined on a skateboard?

Argee Bandoy – title, Finale. Megamall- Though his works still bear traces of the bare-colored constructivists, minimalist abstractionists, the charm lay in the uncomplicatedness of it all and yet it tries to be a bit erudite but just so – concrete poetry amongst the steel high-rise of Ortigas. But what of the small cut-out shirt with a red button hanging on a framed-wire? The punchline to all such facetious

Attachment – group show (Bembol, Rain, etc), Galerie Joaquin, San Juan
Another case of a show coinciding with another opening (Yason’s at Silver Lens) as a mere few trickled in, partly to blame the location or the unfamiliarity of the place – somewhere tucked within rows of family-owned restaurants that are built for swooning couples, a date place. But the buzz around the works lasted for more than its duration – esp. those by _________ which at first glance can be gleamed as another clone of Louie Cordero when he was starting out, but man, the finish is impeccable – poster-like, a web-page jumping out for your cornea.


Lamierda . Amy Aragon . Mag:net ABS CBN- Compares painting to either cake or shit for all its gooeyness. But being too literal about painting and caging objects with faint traces of said inspiration kinda flushes the idea all the way down to the gutter. The point, however, is her manic lust for paint – revealing much her primalness, wanting to spread all over. Can you handle it ?

Jay Ticar – Pressure Points, Mag:net ABS CBN- A bouquet of flowers encased in ice, slowly melting down the gallery floor – an unforgettable image as much as for the gallery staff who might have continually mopped-off its leakings as ordered by the building management.


Jevijoe Vitug – title, small gallery, CCP- the self is the medium – where have I heard this before? Spaghetti poring over a lipsynching mouth ? Duh? The history of art, of painting as a Spaghetti western? World giving birth to spaghetti? I didn’t know if my experience of this show would have been complete if I have viewed the video that was also set-up. But it was probably just props since it wasn’t working when I visited it or unnecessary even if it would show the same images as the painted ones, gradually accomplished per piece. I laughed it off entirely soon after exiting. But hey, that’s kinda rare isn’t it when walking through some show?

Yason Banal – title, Silver Lens Gallery, Makati- Jet should review this.
- Make connection between Morrissey and Yason since both are quite hung-up on fandom/stardom and Yason is so a fan of Morrissey and Nora Aunor.
- Just saw the fotos from Pox and noticed that it was all images of local showbiz stars amateurishly manipulated by photoshop and so framed as if to recall a gothic appeal after being thronged through feasts of the Black Nazarene – okay in another way – it’s regal films gothic recto camp, not! Not! Not!

Group Show. Cinema Purgatorio. NCCA. Intramuros. Manila Held as one of such projects the committee can vouch for having done something for the year, like providing merienda for its employees for the day it opened. What was worse was that they didn’t even know that there was a show going on or where the works mere lobby décor? Of course they’ve missed the serenade being played for them by Pok’s blind musicians, plucking at their improvised guitars tunes beyond their repertoire of Pamulinawen in the darkened screening hall. And what would this NCCA show be without the prescriptive ethnic/intuitive sound thing/performance?

Poklong Anading. Disappearance Resonates. Theo Gallery, Saguijo Café, Makati.
Concrete painting replacing line drawings. Hmmm where have I seen this before ?

Soundlab/ sound art happenings at Future Prospects with Sabaw collective (Pow Martinez, Ria, Tengal, Jet Melencio, Elemento, the Brockas, Inconnoictu) plus Fascist Nights at FP - a whole new way of boozing with the heightened sense perception of drones and samplings.