The Street Art of Kadre

I met Kadre, another artist who has made the streets his gallery, through Barrios. And from our informal talk, I learned that most of his works can be found in the streets of Manila. I have yet to sit down with him to get to know more about him as an artist. He says he is not worried at all if they scrape off his work eventually from the wall, and that a few days of his work being seen by the public is enough for him.

For now, here is a sample of his work, wheatpasted in Valenzuela (June 2011).

Brian Barrios and Kadre Wheatpasting in Valenzuela (june 2011)

Update on Brian Barrios.

May 21. Barrios participated in Disconnect 3: Sticker/Poster Art Exhibition, in Kalye Art Gallery at 1220 Singalong St., Malate. This was organized by both Pilipinastreetplan and StreetKonect

See wheatpasting with Kadre:

Barrios x Kadre Wheatpaste from CAVITY COLLECTIVE on Vimeo.

June 5, 2011

Wheatpasting with Kadre in Valenzuela

The Street Art of Brian Barrios

I only started noticing these eyecatching street art late in 2010 dotting the McArthur highway (Valenzuela) on my way to and from my Manila office. One day, in February, I finally had the chance to photograph most of it and immediately posted most of it in my facebook account. It soon got comments including one from poet Angelo Suarez who had been most helpful in helping me identify the artist behind it. Angelo suggested that I get in touch with Pilipinas Street Plan (PSP), specifically Mark Salvatus, a cross-disciplinary artist based in Manila and a core member of an artist-run initiative called TUTOK, as well as co-founder of PSP under the Boy Agimat tag. Salvatus has been instrumental in helping me get to know finally the mystery Valenzuela street artist. Most of these street art/post-graffiti (http://www.theroguesgallery.net/post-graffiti/ ) are casually in wall spaces where MMDA art are, or walls of ruins that most often does surprise the passersby. On closer inspection, one would find that they are drawn on Manila paper, then wheatpasted on the walls instead of drawn or spraypainted directly on the walls (via stencil) much like the famous works of Banksy. To my mind, this being the artwork's material, and considering the pollution and weather it is subjected to daily, makes these works of art poignantly ephemeral. Brian Barrio's works capture spontaneous moments of individuals and groups, and for me, are always emotionally charged: a father carrying a son on his shoulders, a father hugging a son, a mother carrying her child, and always drawn in a manner that (at least, to my mind) sculptor Napoleon Abueva would have drawn in had Abueva chosen the medium (not meant to disparage Abueva here, I love Abueva). And these works coming from a 16 year old teener! Interesting, too, to note is that most of the drawings feature characters that are smiling. And then I came upon Brian Barrio's blog site, which explains the "smiles." I am glad to have captured a photo of most of his works in the streets of Valenzuela while they are still intact. Valenzuelanons, take note, Brian Barrios is a fellow Valenzuelanon after all! (and have your photo ops with the works while you can before the July rain slushes them away).

And am the more glad because I was able to engage Brian Barrios in a short light interview, which I am posting here:

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Rei Alba (RA): Anu ba modelo mo? Actual na tao or sa isip lang?

Brian Barrios (BB): May reference ako. Pictures.

RA: Bat ayaw mo na pintahan mismo ung pader?

BB: Hindi pa ako sanay. Magprapraktis nga ako mag-paint sa canvas ngayon e.

RA: Ah oks. At saka mas matagal kang andun nakatayo, masita ka pa for graffiti nga :)

BB: Oo. Tama.

RA: Panu un? May dala kang balde ng pandikit at tambo ng walis?

BB: Oo.

RA: Anu time mo ba usually nilalagay?

BB: Gabi po.

RA: Super gabi?

BB: Hindi naman, basta dumilim na. Mga 6 o 7.

RA: Buti di ka nahuhuli. As in super bilis mo lang magdikit?

BB: Hindi naman ako natatakot mahuli e. Sa tingin ko hindi naman ilegal ang ginagawa ko.

RA: May mga naninita ba sayo?

BB: Wala

RA: Ikaw lang talaga ang nagdidikit? Walang barkada?

BB: Wala e. Wala kase akong kaibigan na interested sa ginagawa ko. Isa rin sa dahilan kaya ako nag-street art ay para mgakaroon ng mga kaibigan na mahihilig sa art.

RA: Ba't un bang mga kaibigan mong iba, anu hilig?

BB: Computer. Dotadota

RA: Nag dodota ka rin ba?

BB: Hindi. Internet lang.

RA: Nagba-bastketball ka rin?

BB: Oo.

RA: Ga'no katagal ka magdrawing ng isang tao or figure?

BB: Isang buong araw. Minsan dalawang araw, kalahating araw. Depende sa gagawin ko

RA: Sa salas nyo?

BB: Sa kwarto ko, kwarto namin. Parang studio ko na rin.

RA: Nag-background music ka ba habang drawing? O walang istorbo?

BB: Radyo. Ahaha. Simple lang. Ahahha.

RA: Nagbe-break ka naman para kumain or tuloy tuloy?

BB: May break syempre.

RA: May sketch ka muna sa pencil? Tapos pentelpen ba ung black?

BB: Paint po yun, latex paint. Opo sketch muna.

RA: Nakaka ilang lata ka ng latex paint? Ung maliit lang ba un? Puro black lang ?

BB: Actually, 2 lata ng maliit lang ang nauubos ko ngayon. 2 lata palang sa ngayon.

RA: Ilang brush meron ka para magawa un?

BB: Apat: Number 1, 3, 7.

RA: Tapos alin dun sa na piktyuran ko ang pinakauna mong nagawa?

BB: Eto
http://prodyeksmile.blogspot.com/2010/10/i-just-need-somebody-to-love.html
Medyo hindi pa ayos yung gawa ko dyan.

BB: Yung Smile Projects pala, positivity ang motibo ko dun. Kaya ginawa ko yun, kase karamihan ng mga street artist ngayon, medyo negative ang tingin sa kanila. So, naisip ko mas mganda kung gagawin kong medyo postive yung ipinararating nung mga gawa ko.

RA: Alin na ung first na work mo na part ng Smile Projects?

BB: Yung sa may Fatima.

RA: Yung may camera?

BB: Oo kasali din yun, pati yung mag ama.

RA: Mga kelan pa yun?

BB: Mga October 2010.

RA: Panu mo pinipili ang space mo pala?

BB: Basta pader na maraming makakakita.
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So, without further ado, here are Brian Barrios' works.
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Location: near RT before PSB bank coming from Malanday.

Location: by the Honda store across Novo (coming from Malanday)

Location: Junkshop in Karuhatan after Sabino Funeral house.

Location: at the landing of the footbridge across South supermarket (McArthur highway).

Location: Malanday

Location: BBB near BPI bank (status: gone)

* Most recently, Brian Barrios participated in his first group exhibition with co-PSP members titled "RepubliCAN: an Exhibition of Spraycans and Works Based on Street Art" last April 8, 2011 at The Collective in Malugay Street in Makati City.

For the latest on street art, read Beyond Graffiti.

Epjey Pacheco's Streams of X&Y at West Gallery this March 2011!

Epjey Pacheco opens his first one-man exhibit titled "Streams of X&Y" at West Gallery, West Avenue, Quezon City, on March 1, 2011.

Epjey Pacheco puts on paper what he deems as random streams of consciousness. All illustrations on found paper and ink are untitled. Pacheco did not want words to limit what the viewer could see or feel as he or she sees the works for the first time. Everyone has free rein in interpreting the images.

“It is my first time to have a solo show, and I decided not to be bound by a specific theme. I want it to be spontaneous, a culmination of my young art career so far,” notes Pacheco, aiming to highlight his background as an illustrator in his solo debut.

U.S.T. graduate Pacheco is also part of the group/community of artists called Pilipinas Street Plan (http://www.pilipinastreetplan.blogspot.com/) co-founded by Mark Salvatus.

Look up Pacheco's works via Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/epjey?ref=ts#!/album.php?id=681629326&aid=83004

Where?

West Gallery
* Address: 48 West Avenue, Quezon City, Philippines 1100
* Telephone:+63 2 411 0336
* Fax:+63 2 411 9221
* Email:info@westgallery.org
• Venue: West Gallery, 48 West Avenue, Quezon City, Philippines 1100
• Contact No.: +63 2 411 0336
• Email Address: info@westgallery.org

Joselito Jandayan: "Snippets"

"Snippets"
May 17 to June 4, 2009
Gray Wall, Kaida Gallery
2nd Floor, GFO Building, 122 Kamuning Road,
Diliman, Quezon City
tel. 414-4777


Seeing Joselito Jandayan's works up close for the first time at the opening of "Snippets," I couldn't help but be disturbed at once by its overall melancholic mood, made palpable by the distortion of the figures (one that vividly recalls for the viewers the works of Elmer Borlongan executed in the same manner: e.g "Bay Side," 1991, oil on canvas). For a moment, I was even afraid that both the male and female figures by the railroad would drip slowly out of the canvas and onto the floor. I took longer looking at a painting of a boy, and a girl standing side by side, with the girl's left eye hollowed out, and through which viewers could see a blue sky. The boy's left arm had seemed to be grossly dislocated, and the boy seemingly oblivious to the situation. This being the fourth solo exhibit of Jandayan, I went home that night and search through google for Jandayan's past works. I came upon half-faced figures that were giraffe-like in form, and billowed half-heartedly over the canvas, glassy one-eyed figures that seemed to have consciously put their faces too close to the glass frame ("Mr. Dimakabenta," "The Farthest I've Been," "After the First Time," etc.), wary like deers sensing troubles that they could not see, yet willfully staying put, almost desperately wishing for someone or something from the other side to crash through.



Joselito Jandayan (born in Zamora Paco, Manila in 1973) is also a graduate of the Technological University of the Philippines with a Bachelors degree in Fine Arts, majoring in Advertising in 1997.

Before being swallowed up completely by the corporate world (working as a Graphic designer and a freelance digital illustrator for a website company), he stopped working and devoted his time painting full time.

Exhibit history (solo):
“Solo Plight”- 1st solo exhibit held at Nineveh Artspace in Sta Cruz, Laguna Philippines - November 25, 2007
“Kinarir” -2nd solo exhibit held at Kaida gallery in Kamuning, Quezon City Philippines - May 11, 2008
“Awakened Allegory” - 3rd solo exhibit held at Niniveh Art Space in Sta. Cruz, Laguna – October 26 to November 19, 2008

Jerson Samson: "Tawid Gutom" @ Kaida Gallery

May 2009

Viewing Jerson Samson's work is a delight to see with its slices of Filipinos lives.



In his latest exhibit title "Tawid Gutom" at Kaida Gallery, having opened on May 17 and on view until June 4, 2009, viewers are bound to be amused anew by his portrayals of Filipinos families confined within small spaces, including his triptych on streetfood, the faces of the men eating it ballooning out of the canvas. And all are rendered either in his somber blue or in his signature fiery colors. Colored in this manner, his largest work on the cross-bearing Christ with its impasto treatment, make itself seem to burst out of the canvas as confetti-ed madness and shapeshifting energy at once. This then viewing of Samson's current works has turned out to be, not mere morsels to ease away hunger pangs for a bit of art, but a delectable selection, and an easy feast for the eyes.




This is Samson's 9th exhibit and is a young (born in 1976) but multi-awarded painter. He majored in painting at the University of the Philippines College of Fine Arts. He is among the top five winners in the 1999 Phillip Morris Philippine Art Awards. His previous exhibit titled "Tayo" was also mounted at Kaida Gallery in 2008.

Kaida Gallery is at the 2nd Floor GFO Bldg., Kamuning Rd.,Quezon City
Tel. No. 414.4777 or email info@kaidagallery.com

18 x 24 @ Metro Gallery

By the exhibit's title alone, one need not wonder about the sizes of the works, but what to see on those canvases made the pulse run quicker, especially with this viewer having just come from another great exhibit opening (Jarque's & Valdezco's).

Metro Gallery mounts “18x24,” opened on May 16 (and on view until May 26), at Metro Gallery, 455 P. Gueverra St., San Juan (right beside Cafe Ysabel).




The show featured the works by Jason Montinola, Tyago Almario, Vincent De Pio, Aileen Lanuza, Wesley Valenzuela, CJ Tanedo, Randalf Dilla, Alrashdi Mohammad, Kris Jan Gavino, Clint Catalan, Marlon See, Parker Encisa, Jigger Cruz, Keka (Becca Rodriguez), Carlo Ongchangco, Gino Tioseco, Joselito Jandayan, Kadin Tiu, Raffy Napay, Rovi Salegumba, Averil Paras, Marcial Pontillas, Heraldo Corpuz, Epil Franklyn, Mike Velasco, Ronald Caringal, Cesar Delgado, Egg Fiasco, JJ Zamoranos, Scott Garceau, Benjie Bermudez, Robert Shook, Julmard Vicente, Rianne Salvarita, Bjorn Calleja, Lawrence Borsoto, John Suter Pongongan, Demosthenes Campos, Henry Royales, Bernardo Del Mundo, Mitch Valera, Nemo Aguila, Ferdinand Cacnio, Delf Campos, Rizaldy Garra, Jojo Lofranco, Adonai Artificio, and Mark Salvatus.

Cesar Delgado's work (uppermost right) highlighting the face of a baby, and below it the work of Corpuz and Mohammad.

Artist Marlon Magbanua admires a work.

Campos' signature abstraction work in the middle.

It is a great feeling to have bumped into Dumaguete-based artist and once co-officemate Rian Salvarita, who eagerly told me that his work had been sold. I checked out all the works and signature pieces of Cacnio, Dilla, Campos, Mohammad, Corpuz, Jandayan, and Delgado, among others. Delgado has returned to painting after a brief absence, having found work abroad, but tells us that he has gone back into his first love, this time on a full time basis.

Artist Salvarita and his Dali-inspired work above us.

For information on the exhibit, call or SMS Chitty Cometa at 0917-8115399.