The 14th artist

A discreet, private organization with the best intentions to promote art in our country is now accepting nominations for the 14th artist award, to be given to any Filipino artist with a considerable body of work but who has not received a major award even if well past the age of consent and majority, not least the 13 Artists Award given on a more or less regular basis by the state cultural agency, mostly for work that is yet to come. If the 13 Artists Award is like a crystal ball of promise and whose past awardees more often than not fulfilled their potential, thus making the list of previous winners read like a who’s who of Philippine art past, contemporary and future, then the 14th artist award is for one who escaped the notice of the 13 Artists judges, not for any lack of foresight on their part but on the very unpredictable brilliance of the overlooked, maverick artist.

Thus the 14th artist must at least be 40 years old, or better, at least 41, so that it would be the numerical palindrome of the award, though this does not necessarily disqualify the artist from eventually winning the 13 Artists Award which has its share of latebloomers in its fold, i.e. not necessarily all winners are below 31 years of age. Preferably the artist must have exhibited abroad, or done some work as an overseas Filipino worker whether as artist or manual laborer, as well as joined a group show or exhibited solo on native shores.

The 14th artist award, more importantly, does not seek to compete with or question the soundness of the 13 Artists choices, indeed, to each his or her own. In the Philippines where artists are so many and awards and grants and recognitions so few, certainly another award should be welcome, however fictional it is at the moment because largely in the conceptual stage.

To my mind the late bohemian Pepito Bosch should qualify for such an award, if posthumously. He was not an outright artist in the strictest sense of the term, but he certainly had the temperament of one. It’s a puzzlement why his death mask cannot be found at the Penguin Café in Malate, where he used to hang out playing imaginary bongos, round eyes wide shut. “Whoo whoo, whoo, whoo,” he would chant, under the yellowing moon of our old Manila. He was however more from Pasay side, between Libertad and Edsa, a stone’s throw from the rambling elevated LRT tracks with the poster poetry and instant voyeurs. It is hereby proposed that the death mask of Pepito de Pasay — as prime inspiration for the 14th artist award — be given as a kind of trophy or memento to any future winner.

Neither should the award be restricted to individual artists, but groups or a movement should also qualify. In this wise one of the first nominations should be the art rock group the Brockas, comprised of the auteurs Roxlee, Lav Diaz and Khavn dela Cruz. The problem is hardly anyone takes them seriously, not least themselves. But have you seen their work even as individual artists, however prone they are to excess and general wildness? Roxlee’s Planet of the Noses is by now a classic illustrated work with memorable characters named Yoholeho, Adenoida and Gogol. Diaz’s pre-epic work has been included in the Philippine program in Busan this October. And Dela Cruz, who has released books of poetry and fiction aside from the digital features, comes up with the regular multiply invite that is like the void answering back.

The Brockas can be heard on one cut on the soundtrack for the Peque Gallaga-directed Pinoy Blonde, rocking and reeling in the years to oblivion. Certainly the Brockas deserve to be shortlisted for the 14th artist.

Any one of the loosely named group Obscenarists should also be considered for the award. Norway-based artist Benjie Lontoc, after wowing the local art world in his younger years fresh out of Philippine Women’s University, has been working in the kitchen of a hotel in that ice-cold country for close to a decade, but he has still found time to work on his art during off hours, mostly pastel on Oslo paper, black on white or is it the other way around, look up his website www.benjielontoc.com for samples of how a Pinoy keeps art and soul together in a foreign land. Lontoc is around town for his annual visit, and is looking to exhibit his recent works possibly at Hiraya in the long run.

Word also has it that the artist photographer Pinggot Zulueta has returned to his old haunts in Intramuros around the Manila Bulletin, to once again draw, focus, shoot for a living after years in New Zealand as construction laborer among other hardhat jobs, the land of a thousand lakes’ loss is the Pasig river’s gain, bringing with him a new Maori sensibility to his depth of field.

We’re a bit worried about our old bosom buddy Dante Perez, who used to have a show solo, joint or group every quarter in the past two or three years. So that his sudden silence is disconcerting, or it could be that the text message received by Rox while we were drinking with Lontoc at Shaw one Saturday evening was true: his wife Madeline has passed on. His “Petrified Hope” still hangs on the living room wall, and I owe him a book or two, and not some imaginary award.

The 14th artist is for the obscure and half-forgotten. Missed the train but still bound for glory. Next trip na lang, Consuelo de boladas. Like Tunesmith owner Dennis Yee who died of complications from Parkinson’s disease last May, as 14th artist kibitzer Romy Buen told me. The now-shuttered watering hole formerly on N. Domingo and later Aurora Boulevard was where we listened to old records, Dennis’ shaking hands putting the stylus to vinyl, blues for Allah and nostalgia hitting us like the plague.