ENHANCE LESSON ON (LESSON 2)

CONTEMPORARY ART FORMS

AND PRACTICES FROM THE
REGIONS
“Historical changes are presumably one of the most significant movements in art style use.
They modify numerous parts of styles including the social and material changes, whatever periods of
time, art will always be there for artists to express themselves in whatever form of art that they
choose, becasue for an artist, art is an expression made noticeable by a structure. The articulation
contained in the structure is an endeavor to interpret the anonymous and the obscure. Natural for our
reality as people is our journey to make significance, and craftsmanship permits that procedure to
happen. Making importance includes understanding our environmental factors and denoting our
encounters.”

After going through this lesson, the students are expected to:

1. classify the 2 major forms of arts in the Philippines;

2. identify the art forms and practices or initiatives from the regions; and
3. appreciate contemporary art forms and practices through identifying themselves by their
our artistic works.

This module is about:

● The Philippine Contemporary Art, divided into 2 major art forms namely: visual arts and performing
Arts

* The Performing Arts such as literature, music, theater, dance, architecture and film

* The Visual Arts as Drawing, Painting Sculpturing, Architectural

● The evolution and characteristics of the various art forms as they developed from the American
Colonial period up to the present

Performing arts –
Performing arts refers to forms of art in which artists use their voices, bodies or inanimate
objects to convey artistic expression. Performing arts may include dance, music, opera, theatre and
musical theatre, magic, illusion, mime, spoken word, puppetry, circus arts, performance art.

Branches of Performing Arts

Theatre is the branch of performing arts concerned with acting out stories in front of an audience, using
a combination of speech, gesture, music, dance, sound, and spectacle. Any one or more of these
elements is considered performing arts. In addition to the standard narrative dialogue style of plays,
theater takes such forms as plays, musicals, opera, ballet, illusion, mime, classical Indian dance, kabuki,
mummers' plays, improvisational theatre, comedy, pantomime, and non-conventional or contemporary
forms like postmodern theatre, postdramatic theatre, or performance art.

Dance. In the context of performing arts, dance generally refers to human movement, typically
rhythmic and to music, used as a form of audience entertainment in a performance setting. Definitions
of what constitutes dance are dependent on social, cultural, aesthetic, artistic, and moral constraints
and range from functional movement (such as folk dance) to codified, virtuoso techniques such as
ballet]

Dance is a powerful impulse, but the art of dance is that impulse channeled by skillful
performers into something that becomes intensely expressive and that may delight spectators who feel
no wish to dance themselves. These two concepts of the art of dance—dance as a powerful impulse and
dance as a skillfully choreographed art practiced largely by a professional few—are the two most
important connecting ideas running through any consideration of the subject. In dance, the connection
between the two concepts is stronger than in some other arts, and neither can exist without the other.

Music is an art form which combines pitch, rhythm, and dynamic to create sound. It can be performed
using a variety of instruments and styles and is divided into genres such as folk, jazz, hip hop, pop, and
rock, etc. As an art form, music can occur in live or recorded formats, and can be planned or improvised.

The performing arts often aims to express one's emotions and feelings. The Cultural Center of
the Philippines is considered to be the premiere place for performing arts.

The kundiman folk music is a popular music form that is unique to the Philippine islands. It is
music that is a combination of both words and music. Also popular with Filipinos is folk dancing. There
are many variations of dances, both ceremonial and traditional, that are performed for many different
occasions.

There are several types of dance in the Philippines, those with Muslim or Spanish influences as
well as those from the lowlands and mountains.

The Spanish influence in the Philippines brought about many dances that use a Maria Clara dress
(a character in Noli Me Tangere) and an embroidered long-sleeve short made from pineapple fibers for
their costumes. The Filipinos adapted these Spanish dances by using bamboo castanets and Asian fans.
Carinosa, which means loveable or affectionate, is a dance that is known all through the Philippines. The
dancers "flirt" using a handkerchief or fan, by playing hide and seek with them. Part of a wedding ritual,
the sabalan lulay, is a dance that begins with a man dancing around a woman (his partner) until she
consents to dance with him.
 Possibly the most popular and best known dances are those from the Philippine lowlands. A
place of extreme beauty and love of life and simplicity, the lowlands have a passion for music. A
spirited dance from Bayambang is the Binasuan, which is basically a balancing act. The dancers skillfully
handle glasses are partially filled with rice wine and usually perform at birthdays and weddings.
Maglalatik, a simulated-war dance, is a four part dance which starts out with mock-fighting and ends
with reconciliation. Initially a depiction of a fight between the Christians and Moros, it is also performed
as a mark of respect for San Isidro de Labrador, the patron saint of farmers.

http://www.asianinfo.org/asianinfo/philippines/performing_arts.htm#:~:text=Performing%20Arts%20in
%20the%20Philippines&text=The%20Cultural%20Center%20of%20the,unique%20to%20the
%20Philippine%

Visual Arts in Philippines

The art, or the expressions of the human experiences in the Philippines mirror a general
public with assorted social impacts and conventions. The Malayan people groups had early
contact with merchants who presented Chinese and Indian impacts. Islamic conventions were
first acquainted with the Malays of the southern Philippine Islands in the fourteenth century.
Most current parts of Philippine social life advanced under the unfamiliar standard of Spain
and, later, the United States. In the sixteenth century the Spanish forced an unfamiliar culture
situated in Catholicism.

During the primary portion of the twentieth century, American impact made the
Philippines one of the most Westernized countries in Southeast Asia. The social developments
of Europe and the United States significantly affected Filipino specialists, much after autonomy
in 1946. While drawing on Western structures, in any case, crafted by Filipino painters,
essayists, and performers are instilled with particularly Philippine topics. By communicating the
social extravagance of the archipelago in the entirety of its decent variety, Filipino specialists
have assisted with molding a feeling of national character.

Visual arts in Pre-Spanish Colonial Period

Manunggul Jar from Palawan (890–710 BC)

 Early Filipino painting can be found in red slip (clay mixed with water) designs
embellished on the ritual pottery of the Philippines such as the acclaimed Manunggul Jar.

The Manunggul Jar is a secondary burial jar excavated from a Neolithic burial site in
Manunggul cave of Tabon Caves at Lipuun Point at Palawan dating from 890–710 B.C

Painting are also manifested in the tattoo tradition of early Filipinos, whom the
Portuguese explorer referred to as Pintados or the ‘Painted People’ of the Visayas.

Early Filipino’s painting can be manifested today among the arts and architecture of the
Maranao who are well known for the Nāga Dragons and the Sarimanok carved and painted in
the beautiful Panolong of their Torogan or King’s House.

Visayan pintados

 Visual arts in Spanish Colonial Period

Artistic paintings were introduced to the Filipinos in the 16th century when the
Spaniards arrived in the Philippines. Spaniards used paintings as religious propaganda to spread
Catholicism throughout the Philippines. Paintings appeared mostly on church walls, featured
religious figures appearing in Catholic teachings.  Filipinos began creating paintings in the
European tradition during the 17th- century Spanish period. Most of the paintings and
sculptures between the 19th, and 20th century produced a mixture of religious, political, and
landscape art works, with qualities of sweetness, dark, and light.

Visual arts in Post-Spanish Colonial Period (Modern)

Early modernist painters such as Damián Domingo was associated with religious and
secular paintings. The art of Juan Luna and Félix Hidalgo showed a trend for political statement. 
Artist such as Fernando Amorsolo used post- modernism to produce paintings that illustrated
Philippine culture, nature, and harmony.
 Sculpture

Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. It is one of the
plastic arts. Durable sculptural processes originally used carving (the removal of material) and
modelling (the addition of material, as clay), in stone, metal, ceramics, wood and other
materials but, since Modernism, there has been an almost complete freedom of materials and
process. A wide variety of materials may be worked by removal such as carving, assembled by
welding or modelling, or moulded or cast.

Philippine Sculpture is the most familiar art forms among Filipinos. From the transitional
carving of anitos to the santos to Christ and down to the saints, Filipinos find it rather not
difficult as they are already familiar with.

Indigenous woodcarving is one of the most notable traditional arts in the Philippines,
with some crafts in various ethnic groups date back prior to Hispanic arrival with perhaps the
oldest surviving today are fragments of a wooden boat dating to 320 AD.[50] Many societies
utilize a variety of woods into making wood crafts such as sacred bulul figures. These divine
wooden statues, known in various groups through different generic names, abound throughout
the Philippines from the northern Luzon to southern Mindanao. The art of okir on wood is
another fine craft attributed to various ethnic groups in Mindanao and the Sulu archipelago.
Wood crafts of specific objects, such as sword hilts, musical instruments, and other objects are
also notable, where depictions of ancient mythical beings are usually carved. There are other
indigenous wood crafts and techniques in the Philippines, some of which have been utilized in
Hispanic woodcarvings after colonization, such as the woodcarving styles of Paete.

Bulul god with pamahan cup (15th century)

Religious Hispanic woodcarvings abounded in the Philippines with the introduction of

Christianity. The techniques utilized infuse both indigenous and Hispanic styles, creating a
fusion of Hispanic-Asian wood art. Paete, Laguna is among the most famous woodcarving
places in the country, especially on religious Hispanic woodcarving. Various epicenters of
woodcarving in the Hispanic tradition are also present in many municipalities, where majority
of the crafts are attributed to the life of Christ and the Virgin Mary, where Marian traditions
prevail.
Bas relief at Panay Church (1770’s)

Stone carving is a priced art form in the Philippines, even prior to the arrival of Western
colonizers, as seen in the stone likha and larauan or tao-tao crafts of the natives. These items
usually represents either an ancestor or a deity who aids the spirit of a loved one to go into the
afterlife properly. Ancient carved burial urns have been found in many areas, notably in the
Cotabato region. The Limestone tombs of Kamhantik are elaborate tombs in Quezon province,
believed to initially possess rock covers signifying that they were sarcophagi. These tombs are
believed to have been originally roofed, as evidenced by holes marked onto them, where
beams have been placed. Stone grave marks are also notable, with the people of Tawi-Tawi,
and other groups using the carved marks with okir motif to aid the dead. In many areas, sides of
mountains are carved to form burial caves, especially in the highlands of northern Luzon. The
Kabayan Mummy Burial Caves is a prime example. Marble carvings are also famous, especially
in its epicenter in Romblon. Majority of the marble crafts are currently meant for export, mostly
Buddhist statues and related works.With the arrival of Christianity, Christian stone carvings
became widespread. Most of which were either parts of a church such as facades or interior
statues, or statues and other crafts intended for personal altars. A notable stone carving on a
church is the facade of Miagao Church.

  Ivory carving is an art practiced in the Philippines for more than a thousand years, with the
oldest known ivory artifact known is the Butuan Ivory Seal, dated 9th–12th century. The
religious carvings of ivory, or garing as locally known, became widespread after the direct
importation of ivory into the Philippines from mainland Asia, where carvings focused on
Christian icons, such as Madonna with Child, the Christ Child, and the Sorrowful Mother. Many
of the ivory carvings from the Philippines have gold and silver designs. The ivory trade in the
Philippines boomed because of the demand for ivory carvings, and continued up to the 21st
century. In recent years, the Philippine government has been cracking down on the illegal ivory
trade. In 2013, the Philippines became the first country in the world to destroy its ivory stock,
to show solidarity among like-minded nations against the ivory trade which has decimated the
world’s elephant and rhino populations. Horns of dead carabaos have been used as a substitute
to ivory in the Philippines for centuries.

Architecture
 Architecture is an artistic expression that reflects how we present ourselves over the
world’s scene, and, as other expressive mediums, it changes with styles, advancements and
social transformations.

The architecture of the Philippines reflects the historical and cultural traditions in the
country. Most prominent historic structures in the archipelago are influenced by Austronesian,
Chinese, Spanish, and American architectures.

For 2,000 years the mountainous province of Ifugao have been carefully cultivated with
terraced fields.  The structures’ original builders used stone and mud walls to carefully carve
and construct terraces that could hold flooded pond fields for the cultivation of rice. They also
established a system to water these plots by harvesting water from mountaintop forests. These
engineering feats were done by hand as was the farming itself.

Maintenance of the rice terraces reflects a primarily cooperative approach of the whole
community. Invention of various tools allowed for the fabrication of tent-like shelters and tree
houses. Early Classical houses were characterized by rectangular structures elevated on stilt
foundations and covered by voluminous thatched roofs ornamented with gable- finials and its
structure could be lifted as a whole and carried to a new site.

The Bahay Kubo is the Filipino word for Nipa huts, they were the native houses of the
indigenous people of the Philippines before the Spaniards arrived. They are still used today,
especially in rural areas.  Different architectural designs are present among the different
ethnolinguistic groups in the country.

With the arrival of Indianized and Muslim scholars from nearby Indonesia, the native
Filipinos were introduced to the concept of the Kota or fort. The Muslim Filipinos of the south
built strong fortresses called kota or moong to protect their communities.  kotas still stand to
this day.

With the arrival of Islam in Mindanao, Mosques, the masjid was extensively built, like
the Sheik Karimal Makdum Mosque in Simunul, Tawi-Tawi, which was built in 1380. During the
establishment of the Sultanate of Sulu, a wooden palace was built for the Sultans which had the
name Astana Darul Jambangan which has been destroyed by a typhoon in 1912. A replica of the
royal palace was rebuilt as an attraction in Mt. Bayug Eco-Cultural Park in the town of Talipao,
Sulu.

St. Agustin church, Paoay, Ilocos Norte

The Bahay na bato, the colonial Filipino house, followed the nipa hut’s arrangements
such as open ventilation and elevated apartments. The bahay na bato was constructed out of
brick and stone rather than the traditional bamboo materials. It is a mixture of native Filipino,
Spanish and Chinese influences. During the 19th century, wealthy Filipinos built some fine
houses, usually with solid stone foundations or brick lower walls, and overhanging, wooden
upper story with balustrades and capiz shell sliding windows, and a tiled roof.

The historic city was home to centuries-old churches, schools, convents, government
buildings and residences, the best collection of Spanish colonial architecture before much of it
was destroyed by the bombs of World War II. Of all the buildings within the 67- acre city, only
one building, the San Agustin Church, survived the war.

With the arrival of the Americans in 1898 came a new breed of architectural structures
in the Philippines. Foremost of the American contributions to the country was the
establishment of civil government. This led to the erection of government buildings from the
city all the way to the municipal level.

The modern era dawned on Philippine architecture using the simple straight lines of the
International Modern Style as a chief mode of expression. By the 1970s, a new form of
Philippine architecture emerged with the filipinization of architecture. By the 1980s the
country’s architectural idiom was swept by the tide of Post Modernism, a hearkening back of
some sort to classical architecture. Today, architecture in the Philippines continue to be vibrant
and with the country opening up to the world, more first rate architecture is pouring in.

The Cultural Center of the Philippines Complex is home to the National Theater
(Tanghalang Pambansa). The theater is the centerpiece of the 77 hectare (190 acres) arts and
culture complex located along Roxas Boulevard in Manila. Designed by Leandro V. Locsin, the
construction of the National Theater began in 1966 and was completed in 1969. The theater is a
primary example of the architect’s signature style known as the floating volume, a trait can be
seen in structures indigenous to the Philippines such as the nipa hut. It houses three performing
arts venues, one theater for film screenings, galleries, a museum and the center’s library and
archives.

Philippine Arena

The Philippine Arena is a multi- purpose indoor arena being constructed at Ciudad de
Victoria, a 75-hectare tourism enterprise zone in Bocaue and Santa Maria, Bulacan, Philippines.
With a capacity of up to 55,000, it is the world’s largest indoor arena once completed.

  https://the-buchiblo.com/en/2020/08/19/visual-arts-in-philippines/

Activity 1 – Create your own Art Masterpiece. You can use all forms of Artwork.

Let Evaluate : Write the letter of your answer and send it to your goggle room class work.

1. Arts are divided in how many major divisions A) 1 B) 2 C) 3 D)4

2. This refers to forms of art in which artists use their voices, bodies or
 inanimate objects to convey artistic expression A)Visual Arts B) Cultural Arts C)
Painting as an Art D) Performing arts
3. It is a popular music form that is unique to the Philippine islands. It is music that is a
combination of both words and music. A) Karinyosa B) Harana C) Pantomina
D) kundiman folk
4. In the context of performing generally refers to human movement, typically rhythmic
and to music, used as a form of audience entertainment in a performance setting.
A) Dance B) music C) drama D) dance and music
5. Which of the following means loveable or affectionate, dance that is known all through
the Philippines. A) Carinosa, B) Harana C) Pantomina D) kundiman folk
6. It is home to the National Theater (Tanghalang Pambansa). The theater is the
centerpiece of the 77 hectare (190 acres) arts and culture complex located along Roxas
Boulevard in Manila. A)The Folk Arts Theater B) The Philippine Arena C) The
Cultural Center of the Philippines D) all of the above
7. It is a multi- purpose indoor arena being constructed at Ciudad de Victoria, a 75-hectare
tourism enterprise zone in Bocaue and Santa Maria, Bulacan, Philippines. With a
capacity of up to 55,000, it is the world’s largest indoor arena once completed. A)The
Folk Arts Theater B) The Philippine Arena C) The Cultural Center of the
Philippines D) all of the above
8. During the establishment of the Sultanate of Sulu, a wooden palace was built for the
Sultans which had the name _______ which has been destroyed by a typhoon in 1912.
A) Astana Darul Jambangan B) Sultan Kudarat C) Darusalam D) none of the above.
9. It is an artistic expression that reflects how we present ourselves over the world’s scene,
and, as other expressive mediums, it changes with styles, advancements and social
transformations A)Sculpture B) Architecture C) Paintings D) Stone Carving
10. Stone carving is a priced art form in the Philippines, even prior to the arrival of Western
colonizers, as seen in the stone likha and larauan or tao-tao crafts of the natives
A)Sculpture B) Architecture C) Paintings D) Stone Carving .
11. It is an art practiced in the Philippines for more than a thousand years, with the oldest
known ivory artifact known is the Butuan Ivory Seal, dated 9th–12th century. A)
Sculpturing B) Ivory carving C) Paintings D) Drawings
12. It was abounded in the Philippines with the introduction of Christianity. A) Religious
Hispanic woodcarvings B) Architural Design C) Religious Paintings D) all of the above
13. The art, or the expressions of the human experiences in the Philippines mirror a general
public with assorted social impacts and conventions. A) Visual Arts B) Performing Arts
C) Cultural Art D) all of the above
14. Painting are also manifested in the tattoo tradition of early Filipinos, whom the
Portuguese explorer referred to as A) Bordados B) Pintados C) Ati atihan D) Aliwan
15. With the arrival of the Americans in 1898 came a new breed of architectural structures
in the Philippines most of them are A) American Buildings B) High Rise Buildings
C) Low Cost Buildings D) Government Buildings