The prestigious Philippine Art Awards (PAA) is a nationwide visual art competition held every two years (Biennial Competition), and is two-tiered: PAA selects five (5) entries each in four (4) separate Collective Regional Areas (CRA): NCR, Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao, on the first year. In the second year, from the 20 CRA entries, five (5) national winners are announced as Grand Prize (1), Juror’s Choice of Excellence (2), and Juror’s Choice of Merit (2) awardees.
From the 24th Philippine Art Awards list of five regional awardees representing Mindanao, three are from Davao: Rodney Yap, Victor Augustus Dumaguing and Leo Patos.
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| Dumaguing, Yap & Patos. 3/5 regional winners representing Mindanao |
The Davao trio’s artworks, along with the rest of the awardees of the 24th Philippine Art Awards are exhibited at the Yuchengco Museum until July 30, 2023.
NOCTURNE by Rodney P. Yap
From the Latin nocturnus, meaning "of the night," emerged the musical term nocturne, which is a composition of a dreamy character evocative of the night. In art, nocturne is a depiction of a nighttime scene. The artist Rodney Yap depicts a traditional stone house, or bahay na bato, not in its historic grandeur but in a depressing, dilapidated, and crumbling state. For the artist, the image is a metaphor for our home, our nation, plunged at this moment in the darkness of social decay and corruption. Within the structure are the seeming residents, rendered in silhouettes or as ideographic forms, representing the people trapped within an inescapable web of bad governance, tyranny, and abuse of power. (Cid Reyes)
RESULTA by Leo G. Patos
The word "armageddon"—the total destruction of the human race—is a Greek transliteration of the Hebrew har Megiddo, which means hill or mountain of Megiddo, now an archaeological site in Israel. Armageddon is the vista that greets us in the work "Resulta," subtitled "Aftermath." With the threatened use of weapons of mass destruction, humanity may just be a push of a button away from total extinction. With the current specter of Russia, China, and that rogue nation, North Korea, the ultimate battle between good and evil is a very real probability. It is the Holocaust that will result in the annihilation of mankind—the horrifying vision that looms up in Leo Patos’s nightmare of the future. (Cid Reyes)
RIDO: The Cycle of Violence by Victor Augustus D. Dumaguing
Mindanao, the second-largest island in the nation with the majority belonging to the Muslim faith, bears the scars of war and violence, as seen in its historical, political, economic, religious, and even personal division. The artist, who hails from the region, addresses the long-disturbing situation called "Rido." It is, Dumaguing writes, "a violent feud that sees the entire clan fighting each other in a cycle of violence that can last for decades." Indeed, for generations. On his seething canvas loom the words "honor" and "pride." Each bearing the bloody kris, or sword, two warriors face off, and at their feet lies a clutter of decapitated heads. Alas, ironically, no two noble values have ever brought so much bloodshed, death, and destruction to Mindanao. (Cid Reyes)
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| 24th Philippine Art Awards National & Regional winners with Mark Clinton Y. Velez (Grand Prize Winner); Samuel Penaso and Michael E. Bacol (Awards of Merit); Michael John A. Hilario and Leonardo Onia Jr. (Awards of Excellence). |
(Sources: Yuchengco Museum, Philippine Art Awards )
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