An Artist's Tribute to the Bamboo Organ
It’s been years since I wanted to mount a show as a tribute to the Bamboo Organ. It just doesn’t happen due to my busy schedule. But early last year, Leo Renier, the Executive Director of the Bamboo Organ Festival and also my choir director and conductor when I was still a member of the Las Piñas Boy’s Choir, invited me to hold a one-man show simultaenous with the 40th Bamboo Organ Festival. And so my desire to pay tribute to the Bamboo Organ was reignited. I grew up in Las Piñas and practically with the Bamboo Organ. Being a member of the LP Boy’s choir, I had those opportunities to sing with the organ as accompaniment during Mass and some events. And mounting a show will just be a befitting tribute since my artistic talent was enhanced by my wonderful experience in the culture and arts as a choir member and with the Bamboo Organ. Whenever I am painting I find inspirations from classical music. And it was the through Bamboo Organ and the Las Piñas Boy’s choir that I got these leanings.
As a member of the Las Piñas Boy’s Choir, I was introduced to the classical music, western and our very own. And the visual artist in me seemed to flourished with my musical experience. I see colors in Barouque music particularly Vivaldi’s concertos and Bach’s extravagant movements. And also from our kundimans where I am inspired to paint in genre. It’s like chicken AND egg for me. Music inspires me to paint as much as I enjoy painting with music.
I am basically a fauvist and a cubist. I love to simplify my subjects. I see forms and colors in my mind and I just copy it on my canvas. I also love to challenge myself into composing cubistic forms from almost any subject. My cubistic forms still reveal the basic image of the subject, but it is just simplified and sometimes deconstructed, forming a visual summary of emotions, gestures and compositions of people and objects. I paint in oil with my pallete knife, imitating the strokes and textures of my oil pastel medium. Thus my freedom of movements is sufficed to visualize my compositions. And while I stretch my personal artistic challenges, I instinctively work within the bounds of the Thomasian virtues which to me could be summarized in Philippians 4:8 “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
I believe that I am only as good as the obra I am working on. And I should be better on my next. So the “best”, the “favourite” are foreign to me. It’s like my mind never stops composing even as I am working on one obra. Ideas just keep pouring in as I paint that I have to have blank canvasses and papers in my studio. In the end, I should honestly say that I love my series. Because every piece is a personal encounter where I discover me. I discover new thoughts and new style and compositions. Every piece is an opportunity to share and communicate my thoughts and my vision of what my perception of life is. There are times though that I donot like what I did and I leave it there for awhile and given time, I get inspired to make better of it, as what my inspirations dictates.
This series is plain exuberance of the fantastic heritage that we have in our country. It is simply a celebration of life. A thanksgiving. That time is of essence and a realization that we have in our own hands a gift that was treasured and we will treasure in future times. And with my contemporary renditions of a revered tradition, I hope to pass to the next generation the feelings of pride and gratitude, feelings I reminished when I was a choir and still the same feelings now as I pay tribute to the Bamboo Organ.
It’s been years since I wanted to mount a show as a tribute to the Bamboo Organ. It just doesn’t happen due to my busy schedule. But early last year, Leo Renier, the Executive Director of the Bamboo Organ Festival and also my choir director and conductor when I was still a member of the Las Piñas Boy’s Choir, invited me to hold a one-man show simultaenous with the 40th Bamboo Organ Festival. And so my desire to pay tribute to the Bamboo Organ was reignited. I grew up in Las Piñas and practically with the Bamboo Organ. Being a member of the LP Boy’s choir, I had those opportunities to sing with the organ as accompaniment during Mass and some events. And mounting a show will just be a befitting tribute since my artistic talent was enhanced by my wonderful experience in the culture and arts as a choir member and with the Bamboo Organ. Whenever I am painting I find inspirations from classical music. And it was the through Bamboo Organ and the Las Piñas Boy’s choir that I got these leanings.
As a member of the Las Piñas Boy’s Choir, I was introduced to the classical music, western and our very own. And the visual artist in me seemed to flourished with my musical experience. I see colors in Barouque music particularly Vivaldi’s concertos and Bach’s extravagant movements. And also from our kundimans where I am inspired to paint in genre. It’s like chicken AND egg for me. Music inspires me to paint as much as I enjoy painting with music.
I am basically a fauvist and a cubist. I love to simplify my subjects. I see forms and colors in my mind and I just copy it on my canvas. I also love to challenge myself into composing cubistic forms from almost any subject. My cubistic forms still reveal the basic image of the subject, but it is just simplified and sometimes deconstructed, forming a visual summary of emotions, gestures and compositions of people and objects. I paint in oil with my pallete knife, imitating the strokes and textures of my oil pastel medium. Thus my freedom of movements is sufficed to visualize my compositions. And while I stretch my personal artistic challenges, I instinctively work within the bounds of the Thomasian virtues which to me could be summarized in Philippians 4:8 “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
I believe that I am only as good as the obra I am working on. And I should be better on my next. So the “best”, the “favourite” are foreign to me. It’s like my mind never stops composing even as I am working on one obra. Ideas just keep pouring in as I paint that I have to have blank canvasses and papers in my studio. In the end, I should honestly say that I love my series. Because every piece is a personal encounter where I discover me. I discover new thoughts and new style and compositions. Every piece is an opportunity to share and communicate my thoughts and my vision of what my perception of life is. There are times though that I donot like what I did and I leave it there for awhile and given time, I get inspired to make better of it, as what my inspirations dictates.
This series is plain exuberance of the fantastic heritage that we have in our country. It is simply a celebration of life. A thanksgiving. That time is of essence and a realization that we have in our own hands a gift that was treasured and we will treasure in future times. And with my contemporary renditions of a revered tradition, I hope to pass to the next generation the feelings of pride and gratitude, feelings I reminished when I was a choir and still the same feelings now as I pay tribute to the Bamboo Organ.
