Lesson 3:

THE CONTEXTS OF
ART
 What is Context?
Context refers to settings, conditions,
circumstances, and occurrences affecting
production and reception or audience response to
an artwork. It is a set of background information
that enables us to formulate meanings about works
of art and note how context affects form.
For example, an indigenous, pre-colonial ritual
object and motif in the everyday life of the
people of the Cordillera region, called bulul. A
human-like figure made of hardwood, the
bulul is believed to be a granary god that
assures the community of a bountiful harvest.
Banaue’s Hiwang
Village
The Bencab Museum in Baguio City
 GASTON DAMAG
Gaston Damag is an artist from the Philippines who takes
pride and inspiration in his culturally relevant artworks. His
artworks range from sculptures to paintings and experimental
installations that integrate the aspects of his heritage. Coming
from the Ifugao community in the rich highlands of the
Cordilleras, Gaston Damag commonly features the image of
the bulul, a rice deity which takes the form of a miniature
humanoid figure, in his artworks
GASTON DAMAG
What are the different contexts of art?

a. Artist’s Background
b. Nature
c. Everyday Life
d. Society, Politics and Economy, and History
e. Mode of Reception
 a. Artist’s Background
The artist's age, gender, culture, economic
conditions, social environment, and disposition affec
art production. The mode of production, which
encompasses the kind of materials accessible to the
artists as well as the conditions surrounding labor,
also hope the work produced by the artist.
 a. Artist’s Background
A traditional artist's resources differ from an artist reared
in a highly urbanized environment like Manila. The
artist’s initiation and training in art might be different,
too. For example, the artist my have studied and trained
through formal schooling, or informally through
workshops or apprenticeships. In other cases, they may
have studied art by themselves.
 a. Artist’s Background
In the town of Betis, Pampanga, sculpture-making
is learned through apprenticeship with a matecanan
mandukit or a master sculptor who maintains a
workshop where young people are trained to make
santos.
 a. Artist’s Background
The mediums, techniques, and styles in traditional
art are shared among members of the community,
resulting in works that are very similar in
character. The end products are usually sold as
unique identity-markers of a community.
 a. Artist’s Background
For example, we tend to associate the red papier-mâché
sculptures of horses or taka with the town of Paete,
Laguna that produces the said works for export or for
local sale.
Taka (Paper Mache)
 a. Artist’s Background
The Tausug National Artist Abdulmari Asia
Imao (awarded in 2006) integrated motifs from
the culture of Mindanao, like the mythical
sarimanok, a rooster carrying a fish on its beak;
and other okir designs in his painting sand
sculptures using modernist styles of figuration.
Sarimanok
Untitled piece (1984) by National Artist Abdulmari
Asia Imao in front of the Vargas Museum
 a. Artist’s Background
Julie Lluch, an artist who hails from Iligan City,
would often emphasize her female identity and
personal experiences in many of her terracotta
works.In Cutting Onions Always Makes Me Cry,
1988, Lluch's self-portrait presents cookin—a role
associated with women in the home—as oppressive
In Cutting Onions Always Makes Me Cry by Julie
Lluch
 a. Artist’s Background
Travels, training, and professional development
broaden the artist's horizons. The exposure of the
painter and National Artist Victorio Edades to the
1913 International Exhibition of Modern Art during
his study in the United States in the early 20th
century was said to have a profound impact on
artistic vision and style.
Victorio Edades
 a. Artist’s Background
The husband and wife Alfredo Juan and Isabel
Aquilizan’s experience as Filipino migrant
artists eking out a living in Australia and in
other parts of the world, has been central to
their body of works.
Alfredo Juan and Isabel Aquilizan
b. Nature

Nature can be seen as a source

of inspiration and a well spring
of materials for art production.
b. Nature
For example, the t'nalak uses abaca
fibers stripped from the trunk of the
banana tree, and colored with red and
black dyes naturally extracted from
roots and leaves of plants.
T'nalak
b. Nature
Using a backstrap loom, the weaver produces
t'nalak designs including stylized forms
inspired by nature: kleng (crab), gmayaw (bird
in flight), tofi (frog), and sawo (snake skin).
b. Nature
We may also observe that many of
Philippine indigenous dances involve the
imitation of natural elements, such as the
waves of the waters or the movement of
animals - from birds to fishes, to snakes
and fireflies, among many others.
 b. Nature
An example is the famous tinikling, which
imagines the tikling- a local bird-as it tries to
escape the field traps set by farmers.
Tikling and Tinikling
b. Nature
The ceramist Nelfa Querubin-Tompkins
has experimented with iron-rich San
Dionisio clay sourced from her native Iloilo.
BLACK POTTERY by
Nelfa Querubin-Tompkins
 b. Nature
Nature is also the environmental
conditions such as topography and
climate.
b. Nature

Traditional Ivatan houses in Batanes

are built using stones and fango for its
walls. The latter is a kind of mortar
formed by combining cogon and mud
bits.
Fango, Cogon, and the Traditional Ivatan House
b. Nature
Junyee made an ephemeral installation at
the grounds of the CCP titled Angud, a
forest once in 2007 was posed as
commentary on the abuse of nature.
Angud, a forest once
(2007)
b. Nature
Veejay Villafranca, one of the photographer
who warned the public about the alarming
effects of climate change, and how it forces
people to become “refugees in their own
land”.
Photos by Veejay Villafranca
 b. Nature
Roy Legarde, a photographer documenting
the effects of Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) in
black and white, one year after it struck the
Visayan region in 2013, show melancholic
images suggesting absenceor loss caused by
natural disaster.
Photos by Roy Legarde
 b. Nature
Fernando Amorsolo, the first to be named
National Artist (1972), has painted
landscapes as romantic pictures, capturing
the warm glow of the sun on verdant land
or clear waters.
 Fernando Amorsolo
painted landscapes as a romantic picture
 D. Society, Politics and Economy, History

The artist’s creative process is affective if not

compromised by patronage, such as of the
State or the Church. The communicative and
evocative potentials of art have been harnessed
to support the colonial order, as exemplified by
the proliferation of religious art during the
Spanish colonial period.
 D. Society, Politics and Economy, History

Changes
 in the society, politics and economy affect artist’s the work that
they do, and the structures that support their production.

The
 19th century is a period which brought much economic prosperity to
a segment of Filipinos who later became the elite.

This
 paved the way for the development of secular art, which identified
the affluent Filipinos as the new art patrons.
 D. Society, Politics and Economy, History

Itwas a significant change considering that patronage was

limited to the church and the colonial government prior to
the 19th century.

Itwas only in the early 20th century when photography

became accessible to local photographers as Kodak set up
shop in the Philippines in 1928.
 Dalagang Bukid

By: Hermogenes Ilagan an Leon Ignacio

D. Society, Politics and Economy, History

Directed by Jose Nepomuceno in 1919, at

the time when the technology integrating
sound in the movies was not yet
developed, live music was synced with
the moving image.
D. Society, Politics and Economy, History

We can think of art not only that gives

us clues about the historical
surrounding its production, but also as
means to re-tell history itself.
Brown Brother’s Burden, ca. 1970, the painting of
National Artist’s Benedicto Cabrera
D. Society, Politics and Economy, History

The said technique of transforming existing

materials through the juxtaposition of elements
taken from one context and placing these in
another to present alternative meanings,
structure, and composition is called
appropriation.
E. Mode of Reception
 Most often, art is encountered via the museum; arranged and
categorized before a public for the purpose of education and
leisure.

 The museum’s power lies in its ability to construct knowledge for

us. Over the years, many artist’s have questions such powers that
institutions like museums maintain.
Gaston Damag’s striking appropriation of
bulul makes us rethink how cultural
representations and methods of display
shape our consciousness.
 Reception is very much affected by our level of exposure to
artforms that may be unfamiliar or have startling or shocking
images.

 In 2010, Mideo Cruz rose to national prominence or notoriety,

depending on your point of view, over his work Poleteismo at an
exhibit titled Kulo or boil at the CCP.
Exhibit titled KULO