Humanities 22: Philippine Contemporary Arts from the Regions
A BRIEF HISTORY OF PHILIPPINE ART
Prepared by: Mr. Paul Ray Mark N. Salsag
 Prior to colonization, art of the ancient Filipinos were
woven into fabric of everyday life.
 Everyday expressions were all integrated within
rituals marked significant moments in a community's
life, like:
a. Planting and Harvesting
b. Funeral Ceremonies
c. Weddings
 Our ancestors, just like all others in the world during
those times, were hunter-gatherers.
 "KANYAW"
 Found in Cordillera Autonomous Region.
 Officiated by a shaman or mumbaki
 Involves animal sacrifices
 "Kashawing"
 In Lake Lanao in Mindanao
 Ritual to ensure abundance during rice planting
and harvesting is observed and performed.
 "Tagbanwa"
 In Palawan
 Believe that every 13th moon, 3 goddesses
descend from heaven to bless the planting of
rice.
 Long before the coming of the Spaniards, the pre-
colonial people of the Philippines already possessed
a varied and vibrant musical culture. The country's
indigenous cultures through the existence of ethnic
musical instruments such as:
a. PIPES
b. FLUTES
c. ZITHERS
d. DRUMS
e. KUDYAPI
f. KULINTANG
g. AGONG
 "Pangalay"
 from Sulu archipelago
 mimetic of the movement of seabirds, the
Mandayas' kinabua, the banog-banog of the
Higaonon and of the B'Iaan communities, and the
man-manok of the Bagobos of Mindanao imitate
the movements of predatory birds.
 "Talip dance"
 -(Ifugaos) is used in courtship and is mimetic of
the movements of wild fowls.
 The Inamog of the Matigsalugs, and the kadaliwas
dance of the T'bolis represent the comedic
movements of mokeys.
 "Tinikling"
 -popular Tagalog folk dance often showcased for
tourist, is evocative of the movements of the
crane, balancing itself on stilt-like legs or flitting
away from the clutches of bamboo traps.
 Pre-colonial Filipinos have been making images
before colonization. This is exemplified by the
country's rich tradition in carving.
 People of the Cordilleras carve the bulul, regarded as
a granary god that plays an important role in rituals.
 The ifugaos also produce the hagabi, wooden bench
that marks the socioeconomic status of the owner.
 Christianized communities in Laguna and Pampanga
are known for carving santos or sculptures of secular
or non-religious orientation.
 In Southern Philippines, curvilinear decorations called
the okir (termed ukkil in Tausug/Samal/Badjao) are
employed in woodcarving.
I. PRE-CONQUEST
 In art historical terms, we refer to art before the
coming of the first colonizers as "pre-conquest". In
stylistic terms, we refer to it as "indigenous" to
emphasize the ides that our ancestors have been
making art even before colonization. It is also
described in cultural terms as "pre-colonial" as a term
to use for the general way of life before colonization.
Although the terms are interchangeable, it is also
useful to keep these distinctions in mind when
studying the art of the past.
 Manunggul Jar, discovered at Manunggul Cave,
Lipuun Point, Palawan is dated to the late Neolithic
period. It is a secondary burial vessel, where buried
and exhumed bones are placed.
 Another cherished living tradition is weaving.
According to Respicio, textile weaving has a long
history that Philippine ethnolinguistic groups have a
rich textile weaving tradition. Textile are not only
functional, they also impart knowledge about people's
belief system.
 A backstrap loom or a pedal loom is used to weave
designs that hold special meaning for a particular
cultural group. Examples of woven textiles include the
pis siyabit, a headpiece woven by the Tausug of Sulu
and malong with exquisite tapestry panels called
langkit woven the Maranao of Lanao del Sur.
 The colorful doubled-layered tepo mat of the Sama of
Tawi-Tawi made of pandan leaves is a remarkable
example of mundane or everyday object with high
artistic value.
 Weaving techniques are also applied in creating tools
for agricultural purposes. In Ilocos region, sturdy
bamboo strips are woven to create fish traps called
bubo.
 In the 16th century, the illustrated manuscript called
the Boxer Codex featured representations of various
ethnolinguistic groups.
 As jewerly, painstaking attention to detail is
manifested in metalwork, such as the lotoans or betel
nut boxes various shapes, made of brass or bronze
produced chiefly by the Maranao of Lanao del Sur.
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 Humanities 22: Philippine Contemporary Arts from the Regions
A BRIEF HISTORY OF PHILIPPINE ART
Prepared by: Mr. Paul Ray Mark N. Salsag
 Textured designs of rhombuses, spirals, circles, and
tendrils swarm over the exterior of functional
containers.
 The design is achieved through a special technique
of metal casting called the lost wax or cire perdue
process which involves the use of moulds filled with
liquified metal that eventually hardens.
 Other vessels that employ the same techniques are
the brass kendi and the gadur, which are used in
ceremonies and are cherished as status symbols or
as heirloom pieces. The kendi is a vessel used for
pouring liquids.
II. ISLAMIC COLONIAL
 Even before the coming of Spanish colonizers, Islam
was already well-entrenched in Southern Philippines,
where it continues to be culturally dominant and
strong. Islam was said to have gained significant
grounding in Sulu as early as the 13th century.
However, it was in the arrival of Sayyid Abubakar of
Arabia in the 15th century that led to a significant turn
of events. He married Princess Piramisuli, daughter
of Rajah Baguinda. When his father-in-law
died,Abubakar succeeded the throne and established
the Sulanate of Sulu. Natives from Zamboanga and
Yakans from Basilan were converted to Islam, with
teachers coming from Jolo Suluand other
practitioners from nearby regions like Brunei. As the
Islamization process in Mindanao strengthened,
Islam became the driving force that enabled the
natives to resist centuries of Spanish colonization.
Islam was embraced as a religion and as a way of life
by the peoples of Mindanao, among them, the
Tausug, Maranao, Maguindanao, Yakan, Samal,
Badjao, to name a few; as well some areas in
Palawan.
 Filipino Muslims recognize that they belong to an
ummah or a community of believers. Central to the
Islamic faith is the doctrine of Tawid or unity of God.
This belief emphasizes the impermanence of nature
and the incomprehensible greatness of the divine
Being. According to Prof. Abraham Sakili, we can
then relate this with two aspects of reality.
1) the object perceived by the ordinary sense
2) the sense of nothingness, a space or a void
empty of all things; to evoke that God is above
and beyond all things.
 How Philippine Muslims organize space in
architecture is also telling of their adherence to the
Tawhid and other Islamic beliefs.
 Sakili observed that many of the Islamic forms are
inclined to project, grow, or have an upward
orientation, in tune with the regard for heaven and to
veer from the "material earth". We can see this
upward orientation of design elements in the
panolong, and elaborately carved protrusion akin to a
wing attached to the torogan or the royal house of the
Maranao. Aside from the mythical sarimanok, the
burraq, a horse with the head of a woman, is also an
important figure believed to carry the Prophet in his
ascension to heaven.
III. SPANISH COLONIAL PERIOD
 While the South remained resistant to Spanish
colonization, the colonizers gained inroads in the
Central part of the islands whose inhabitants we now
refer to as "Lowland Christians". Art that flourished
during the Spanish colonial period conformed to the
demands of the church and the colonial state.
Religious orders were dispatched to convert the
natives to Catholicism as part of the larger project of
colonization. The art forms from that period are
referred to stylistically and culturally as religious art,
lowland Christian art, or folk art.
 To carry out the project of colonization and
Christianization, the natives were forcibly resettled in
towns structured according to the plaza complex.
This relocating became a means of organizing and
gaining control of the native populace. The complex
was designated as the town center and consisted of
the municipio or local government office and the
church. Designed according to the prescriptions of
the Spanish crown, the Church established its
importance in people's lives through its imposing
scale and overall visual appeal. During this period,
cruciform churches following the shape of the Latin
cross were built. In keeping with the prevailing design
of Hispanic churches, the baroque style was
predominantly employed; they were characterized by
grandeur, drama, and elaborate details that purposely
appealed to the emotions. Examples of baroque
churches that have survived to this day are:
a. San Agustin Church
b. Morong Church in Rizal
c. Paoay Church in Ilocos Norte
d. Sto. Tomas de Villanueva Church in Miag-ao
Iloilo
 Images of saints and interpretations of biblical
narratives were considered essential to worship.
Under the strict watch and patronage of the church,
images were produce through painting, sculpting, and
engraving.The friars brought with them Western
models for local artist to copy. Made of ivory or wood,
the imagery of the santo would be based on classical
and baroque models. During the 17th century,
Chinese arisans, under Spanish supervision were
engaged in making icons or saints or santos (in the
vernacular) in wood and ivory; building churches and
houses; as well as making furniture. They were
spread throughout centers of creative production
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Humanities 22: Philippine Contemporary Arts from the Regions
A BRIEF HISTORY OF PHILIPPINE ART
Prepared by: Mr. Paul Ray Mark N. Salsag
such as Cebu, Batangas, Manila, and Ilocos. Their
involvement resulted in works that drew upon
Chinese features and techniques. An example is a
painting of Nuestra Señora del Rosario in Bohol, the
image of which was said to be inspired from Kuanyin,
the deity of mercy in East Asian Buddhism.
 The Greek and Roman classical influence can be
seen in the portion employed as well as the formality
of expression while the trace of the Baroque is
evident in the expressive and emotional
characteristics of the santo. In colonial churches,
santos are displayed in a decorative altar niche called
retablo.
 The Via Crucis is an important inclusion in colonial
churches which are presented either as a series of 14
paintings or relief sculptures depicting Christ's
crucifixion and resurrection.
 Church altars are sometimes decorated with carved
figurative protrusions on the surface called relleves or
with the organic designs of hammered silver or the
plateria. Tha plateria technque is also applied in the
body of the carroza, where the santos are paraded
during town processions.
 With the coming of the Spaniards, who brought
western musical instruments like:
a. PIPE ORGAN
b. PIANO
c. VIOLIN
d. and GUITAR
 Philippine musical forms also took on a very
european flavor ---- with new rhythms, melodies, and
musical forms, that Filipinos proceeded to adopt them
and make their own.
 Catholic liturgical music was intorduce in 1742 when
the then Archbishop of Manila, Juan Rodriguez
Angel, established a singing school at the Manila
Cathedral that taught western church music.
 Outside of Manila, a musical form based on the
Catholic faith would emerge in the pasyon or pabasa
as it is sometimes called-- or the biblical narration of
Christ's passion chanted in an improvised melody. It
is a tradition that has survived to this day.
 Among the lowland Christian communities of
Pampanga, Iloco, Bicol, and Iloilo, secular music
forms such as the awit and the corridor soon
flourished. These were musical forms that were
chanted stories based on European literature and
history and were popular even among the peasantry
who learned the verses purely by rote. At this time,
the kundiman and the balitao, balitao-sentimental
love songs and lullubies also evolved. During the
latter half of the 19th century when revolutionary
sentiments began to develop, the kundiman which
usually spoke of resignation and fatalism, became a
vehicle for resistance.
 Among Mangyans who inhabit the island province of
Mindoro, bamboo poles are cut into smaller nodes
and are etched with Baybayin script used to compose
short poems that tell of courtship and other emotional
concerns. In the town of Ticao, located in southern
province of Leyte, a huge stone was discovered that
contained Baybayin writing believed to be an
invocation for safe journey by sea “zarzuelas or
sarsuwela" was an operetta which features singing
dancing interspersed with prose dialogue which
allowed the story to be carried out in song. The first
zarzuelas that were staged in the Philippines were
entirely Spanich and featured a European cast. Local
playwrights later wrote liberettos in the local
language, hence the term sarsuwela.
 Severino Reyes and Hermogenes Ilagan, who wrote
sarsuwelas in Tagalog were the most distinguished
playwright os their day with Honorata 'Atang dela
Rama (National Artist for theater and Music, awarded
1987) as their most celebrated leading actress.
 The first senakulo or Passion Play was written in
1704 by Gaspar Aquino de Belen. Its narrative was
called entirely from the biblical account of Christ's
passion and death on the cross, adapted into verse
form and translated into the local language. It is
performed during Lent and in some cases, may last
for three days. In some areas, the senakulo was
tweaked to convey Christ's sufferering as a metaphor
for the suffering of Filipinos under Spanish colonial
rule.
 The komedya is another local theater form that
emergedring this period. The komedya depicts the
conflict between the Muslims and Christians. There
were two main types of the komedya.
a. komedya de santo or religoius komedya. It
centers on the life of Christ or of any saints.
b. secular komedya. The moro-moro is a type of
secular komedya. The word 'moro' is derived
from the Spanish word for Moor or the North
African Arabs who ruled parts of Spain from the
eighth to the 15th century. A typical moro-moro
story would usually invlove a love story between
a Christian hero and an Islamic heroin or vice
versa.
 In the visual arts, paintings served an instructive
function through visual interpretation of biblical texts
central to Catholic devotion. An example is Heaven,
Earth, and Hell (1850) a mural by Jose Dans in Paete
Church, Laguna.
 Image making during the period generally conformed
to the preferences of the patrons and not just the
interest and preference of the artist's. Such relations
are at work is the Basi Revolt a series of 14 paintings
by Esteban Villanueva. It chronicles the defeat of
Ilocanos who rebelled against the Spanish
government's monopoly of basi or rice wine in 1821.
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Humanities 22: Philippine Contemporary Arts from the Regions
A BRIEF HISTORY OF PHILIPPINE ART
Prepared by: Mr. Paul Ray Mark N. Salsag
 The reprographic art of printmaking was introduces in
the Philppines as early as the 16th century. Applying
the technique of xylography or woodcut printing,
Doctrina Christiana (teachings of Christianity) was
printed in 1593 in Spanish and Tagalog by Dominican
priest. Doctrina is the first printed book in the
Philippines compiling song lyrucs, commandments,
sacraments, and other catechetical material.
 In 1734, the Jesuit priest Fr. Pedro Murillo Velarde
collaborated with homegrown talents, the artist
Francisco Suarez and the engraver Nicolas de la
Cruz Bagat to produce Carta Hydrographica y
Chorographica de las Yslas Filipinas, the first
scientific map of the philippines.
 The opening of Manila to international trade in 1834,
and of the Suez Canal in 1869 gained economic
benefits for the native elites. The enlivened trade and
commercial ventures also presented to them the
opportunity to study in Europe. From this class rose
the illustrado or the "enlightened" ones. With the
emergence of the native elites as new art patrons,
secular themes in art were explored and developed.
 In the domestic realm, families tended to their altars
comprised of delicate santos placed in a viriǹa, a
bell-shaped glass case; or urna, a humbler, domestic
version of a retablo, often attributed to the
craftsmanship of artist from the Visayan region.
 The rise of this new elite would also manifest in town
organization. Among those that occupied the plaza
complex were the bahay na bato which housed rich
and prominent families. Simon Flores's painting, 1800
documents the family's influence: the magnificent
interior of the family's home, the mother's jewerly, the
delicate fabric and embroidery of their clothing, and
their dignified poses.
 Other renowned miniature painters includes
a. Antonio Malantic
b. Isidro Arceo
c. Dionsio de Castro
d. Justiniano Asuncion
 Combining names of individuals and vignettes of
everyday life, this painting style became popular
when Filipino natives acquired Spanish names in
compliance with a decree implemented in 1884
 Aside from miniaturist painters, academic painters
gained ground as they received their art studies in
local schools, or abroad as in the case of Juan Luna
and Felix Hidalgo. In 1821, Damian Domingo, the
painter known for his watercolor albums of tipos del
pais established the first art school in the country
right at his stud in Binondo Manila. The Academia de
Dibujo was eventually absorbed by where Domingo
served as director. Closing down in 1834 after
Domingo's death, this school was reopened in the
1850s.
 The Academia-trained Lorenzo Guerrero painted The
Water Carrier, which exemplifies the use of
chiaroscuro in genre of the late 19th century.
 The Pampanga-born Simon Flores also produces
genre scenes.A distinct example is the painting,
Primeras Letras, 1890, which features a woman
teaching a child how to read.
 Luna won gold for Spoliarium; while Hidalgo garnered
a silver medal for Virgenes christianas expuestas al
populacho. Both works testify to Filipino artistic
excellence which proved to be at par with the
standards set by the European academy. Luna's
alignment with the ilustrados' propaganda movement
is evident in the painting España y Filipinas, 1886
featuring two women ascending a flight of stairs.
 The Spoliarium may be viewed at the National Art
Gallery of the Philippines and España y Filipinas at
the Lopez Museum.
 Virgenes, currently on a long-term loan to the
National Art Gallery in Singapore, is a part of the
Metropolitan Museum of Manila or MET Collection.
IV. AMERICAN COLONIAL PERIOD (1898-1940) TO
THE POSTWAR REPUBLIC (1946-1969)
 The independence that the Philippines gained after
the revolution of 1896 was cut short with the
establishment of the American colonial government in
the Philippines Bound by the Treaty of Paris in 1898,
Spain "surrendered" the Philippines to United States.
 Plays such as Juan Abad's Tanikalang Guinto or
"Golden Chain" , 1902 Juan Matapang Cruz's Hindi
ako Patay or "I Am Not Dead", 1903 and Aurelio
Tolentino's Kahapon Ngayon, at Bukas or
"Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow", 1903 echoed not
only the nationalist sentiments of their playwrights but
also served as medium for political protest, openly
attacking the Americans. Known as drama simbolico,
these one-act plays came to represent a deep and
profound yearning for freedom.
 In 1915, Lino Catillejo and Jesus Araullo authored A
Modern Filipino, the first Filipino play written in
English.
 Inspired by the City Beautiful Movement introduced in
1893 at the Chicago World Fair, the new urban
design employed neoclassic architecture for its
government edifices and integrated parks and lawns
to make the city attractive by making its buildings
impressive and places more inviting for leisure amid
urban blight.
 De la Rosa was known for his naturalist paintings
characterized by restraint and formality in brushwork,
choice of somber colors, and subject matter, as seen
in the works Planting Rice 1921 and El Kundiman,
1930.
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Humanities 22: Philippine Contemporary Arts from the Regions
A BRIEF HISTORY OF PHILIPPINE ART
Prepared by: Mr. Paul Ray Mark N. Salsag
 A prolific artist, Amrsolo had produced numerous
portraits of prominent individuals; genre scenes
highlighting the beauty of the dalagang Filipina, idyllic
landscapes; and historical paintings. He was also a
graphic artist who rendered drawings or the textbooks
series. The Philippine Readers as well as illustrations
for the newspaper.
 The Independent Guillermo Tolentino is credited for
the iconic Oblation (1935, original/1958, bronze cast
found at the UP Oblation plaza) of the University of
the Philippines and the Bonifacio Monument, 1933 in
Caloocan.
 Unlike the latter's pastoral images, Edades's The
Builders, 1928 showed distorted figures of toiling
workers using dull colors; a shift in the treatment of
form and subject matter.
 "Botong" Fransisco is known for his magisterial
murals, particularly, Filipino Struggles Through
History 1964, one of the largest and most ambitious
in scope, which he did for the Manila City Hall.
 Galo Ocampo is recognized for indigenizing western
icons, as seen in his Brown Madonna 1938 which
sets the mother and child in a native, tropical
environment.
 Edades, Francisco, and Ocampo have been regarded
as the "triumvirate" of modern art after having worked
on several murals together. A collaborative work that
survives to this day is Nature's Bounty, which
portrays a group of women harvesting fruits in a field
JAPANESE OCCUPATION (1941-1945)
 Early moderns and conservative alike continued to
produce art and even participated in KALIBAPI
(Kapisanan sa Paglilingkod ng Bagong Pilipinas)
sponsored art competitions.n 1943 and 1944,
Purugganan and Francisco won KALIBAPI,
respectively.
 Slogans such as "Asia for Asians" made its way to
the public through posters, ephemera, comics, and
Japanese sponsored publications such as Shin-Seiki,
and in newspapers and magazines such as Liwayway
and Tribune. In music, the composer National Artist
Felipe P. De Leon was said to have been
"commanded at the point of the gun" to write Awit sa
Paglikha ng Bagong Pilipinas. Declared as the
anthem specifically for the period, it conveyed
allegiance to the nation reared in East Asia, where
Japan was actively asserting its political power.
 If art was strictly policed during the Second World
War, it brings us little suprise that Amorsolo's
paintings, many of which showed little or no indication
of war's atrocities, continued to be favored. Examples
include Harvest Scene, 1942 and Rice Planting,
1942. These paintings that evoked a semblance of
peace, idealized work in the countryside, and
promoted valuews of docile industriousness. Such
mood is echoed by Sylvia La Torre's hit song Sa
Kabukiran, written in Tagalog in the 1940s by the
acclaimed composer Levi Celerio (National Artist for
Music and Literature, awarded 1997). La Torre's
operatic singing along with an energetic tempo
offered an escape from the troubles of the war.
Comissioned portraits of high officials such as His
Excellency, Jorge B. Vargas, Chairman of the
Philippine Executive Commission, 1943 and
"Independence this Year", said His Excellency,
Premier Tojo, 1943 were also produced at this time.
Portraits representing different ethnoliguistic groups
were produced, and this is exemplified by Crispin
Lopez's Study of an Aeta, 1943. Although scenes
from the war were also made, the imagery remained
neutral, focusing rather on the aesthetic qualities of
ruin and disaster.
 Take Amorsolo's Bombing of the Intendencia, 1942
and Ruins of the Manila Cathedral, 1945 as
examples, they draw attention to the elegant handling
of value in the billows of smoke or the pile of ruins
rather than the urgency of the disaster itself. Works
which depicted the horrors of war such as Diosdado
Lorenzo's Atrocities in Paco and Dominadoe
Cateneda’s Doomed Family were painted after 1945.
 Manansala's The Beggars, 1952 consists of the
image of two women with emaciated bodies, their
forlorn faces set against a dark background capturing
the deariness of poverty. Many of Manansala's
paintings are characterized by transparent cubism, a
style marked by the soft fragmentation of figures
using transparent planes instead of hard-edges ones
as exemplified in the painting Tuba Drinkers, 1954,
 Legaspi's Gadget II, 1949 depicts half naked men
almost engulfed in the presence of machines. Most of
Legaspi's figures in this period are distorted by his
elongating or making rotund forms in a well-ordered
composition, as seen in the painting Bar Girls, 1947.
HR Ocampo's The Contrast, 194, discussed Lesson
1 is a distinct figurative work which exposes dire
human conditions amid the backdrop of modernity.
 Ocampo's painting Genesis, 1968, which puts
together warm-colored shapes, became the basis of
the stunning tapestry hanging at the Man Theater or
Bulwagang Nicanor Abelardo of the CCP.
 The 1950s also saw the construction of modern
architectural structures, particularly churches that
modified or veered away from traditional cruciform
designs. Within the UP Diliman campus, examples
include the Church of Holy Sacrifice, 1955 and the
Church of the Risen Lord, which both employed
concrete as primary material and experimented with
rounded o parabolic forms. Another remarkable
example is the Chapel of St. Joseph the Worker in
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 Humanities 22: Philippine Contemporary Arts from the Regions
A BRIEF HISTORY OF PHILIPPINE ART
Prepared by: Mr. Paul Ray Mark N. Salsag
Victorias, Negros, built by the Czech-American
architect Antonin Raymond.
 Arturo Luz's works is the use of stark linear elements,
as seen in Street Musicians, 1952 which pared down
the figures into lines and basic shapes.
V. 70S TO CONTEMPORARY
 Under the helm of Ferdinand Marcos and Imelda
Marcos beginning in 1965, many cultural projects
ensued amid the backdrop of poverty and volatile
social conditions. Amidst claims of national chaos
of emergency proportions, Martial Law was
declared on September 21, 1972. Under Martial
Law, Marcos envisioned a New Society or
Bagong Lipunan, which worked toward the rebirth
of a long lost civilization, on one hand, and
aspiration to modernization and development, on
the other.
 The discourse of rebirth can also be discerned in
the anthem or songs the regime sponsored and
circulated through the media and public
education channels. The optimism toward a new
beginning was articulated for example, in Levi
Celerio and Felipe Padilla de Leon's composition
for the New Society titled Bagong Pagsiglang.
 At the center of this arts and culture program was
the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP), the
premier bureaucratic entity through which art
acquisition, exhibition making, workshops, grants,
and awards were implemented.
 For the group exhibition Objects, held at CCP in
1973, Chabet tore up a copy of a coffee-table k
on Philippine contemporary art and placed it in a
trash bin. The work, entitled Tearing into Pieces,
was seen as a scandalous critique or the art
world; in her book The Struggle for Philippine Art,
artist, collector, critic and founder of the Art
Association of the Philippines Purita Kalaw-
REFERENCES
Datuin, Flaudette May, et.al. (2016). Contemporary Philippine Arts from the Regions. Rex Book Store, Inc.
Manila, Philippines.
Ledesma described the work as "anti-museum
art".
 Albano (Chabet's successor) argued that
although some experimental forms seemed
wholly foreign, he invoke the practice of adoring
ephemeral and familiar objects in fiestas, which
shared processes and features with installation
art. An early example of installation art is
Junyee's Wood Things, 1981, made of kapok or
cotton pods, installed on the walls and floor of the
CCP's white cube spaces to make these look like
crawlers encroaching on the museum space.
 Social Realism(SR)
 A significant strand that emerged during the
intense political ferment of the 70s and the 80s
was Social Realism or SR, for short. Using
various mediums, techniques, and styles, SR, is
a form of protest art that exposed the
sociopolitical issues and struggles of the times.
 Kaisahan was composed of Antipas Delotavo,
Neil Doloricon, Renato Habulan, Edgar Talusan
Hernandez, Al Manrique, Jose Tence Ruiz, and
Pablo Baen Santos.
 Kaisahan's influence as a collective reached
organizations like the group of UP Fine Arts
Students who eventually became known in the
80s as the Salingpusa.
 Varied forms of expression can be observed from
the period which spilled over from the previous
decades.
 In sculpture, Eduardo Castrillo's gigantic metal
work Pieta, 1969
 In the 90s, when support from the state was
practically non-existent, artist were empowered to
initiate projects like regional festivals. Meanwhile,
as galleries began to spring up inside mall
spaces, equally intriguing were the budding of
alternative and artist-run spaces that supported
experiments and D-I-Y (Do It Yourself) projects of
young artists.