Jomari L.

Labiano BSED 2-A

Biography Essay

Ben Alano

Benjamin Alano was a Filipino Asian Modern & Contemporary painter who was born in
1920. Benjamin Alano's work has been offered at auction multiple times, with realized prices ranging
from $200 USD to $2,266 USD, depending on the size and medium of the artwork. Since 2016 the record
price for this artist at auction is $2,266 USD for Fisherboy, sold at León Gallery, Makati in 2017.

Benjamin Alano (1920 - 1991) was active/lived in Philippines. Benjamin Alano is known for painting. Born
in Taguig, he graduated from the U.P. College of Fine Arts in 1948, and had his first exhibit a year later
with the Philippine Arts Guild. Benjamin Alano was largely inspired by the 1950s. Abstract Expressionism
dominated in the 1950s as a primary method of painting, and explored ideas about the sublime and
spirituality. Artists chose to focus on painting’s formal properties, and Action Painting took inspiration
from the political freedoms of the United States, in opposition to the limitations of the Soviet bloc.
Important artists of this period included Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Mark Rothko, Frank Kline,
Barnett Newman, Clyfford Still and Adolph Gottlieb. In subsequent revisions, the contributions and
efforts of female artists such as Lee Krasner, Joan Mitchell, and Louise Bourgeois have been
acknowledged, amongst many other female creative.

Ben also held art classes for American military families in Cavite. His last work was the San Lorenzo Ruiz
mural at the EDSA shrine, but he is better known today for his paintings done in the realist tradition with
every conceivable Philippine themes as subjects, rendered on canvas, boards and even on velvet.

Gilbert Perez

Gilbert Roland Guevara Perez (December 29, 1959 – July 16, 2008) was a Filipino film-
television director from ABS-CBN. Born in December 29, 1959 at Valenzuela City and died in July 16,
2008 at Quezon City. He is also known as Manong Gilbert.

Gilbert Perez is famous for filming many TV series starting with “Maalaala Mo Kaya” which consisted of 3
episodes that was filmed in 1999-2000. His latest work as a TV Director was “Kahit Isang Saglit” which
was filmed in 2008. Not only was he a TV Director but he was also a Movie Director. Before “Kahit Isang
Saglit” was filmed he started the TV series as a movie director in 2000 the one he did as a TV director
was in 2008 which shows that the film started when he was a movie director before he filmed it as a TV
director. The latest work he filmed as a movie director was “Supahpahpahlicious” in 2008. As for why
this was the last film he ever made was because of his death which occurred in July 16, 2008 at Quezon
City.

Relatives and friends of movie and television director Gilbert Perez' attended the first night of his wake
Thursday night at the Felicidad Room of Arlington Memorial Chapel, 12 G. Araneta Avenue, Quezon City.
The night was a star-studded affair as showbiz celebrities whom he worked with through the years
dropped by to pay their last respects. Spotted inside the chapel were Shaina Magdayao, Vhong Navarro,
Kaye Abad, Michelle Madrigal, Camille Pratts and hunk actor Piolo Pascual. Also present were executives
and officials from ABS-CBN. Relatives, friends and colleagues keep on coming to the wake to see
'Manong' Gilbert for the last time. Known to many as 'Manong,' Director Perez or Gilbert Roland
Guevara Perez in real life died last Wednesday, July 16 at past 10:00 p.m. at the St. Luke's Medical
Center. He was 48. Perez suffered a heart attack last July 1, Tuesday, while directing a scene for ABS-
CBN's upcoming television series "A Time for Us" with actor Jericho Rosales and Malaysian actress
Carmen Soo. His remains were brought to ABS-CBN on Tuesday, July 22, 2008 for viewing at Studio 1,
starting at 5:00 p.m. The final mass was held on July 23, 2008 at 9:00 a.m. in Studio 1.

Manuel Isip

Manuel Rey Isip is a talented artist drawing portrait illustrations for newspapers, as well as
designing advertisements for the motion picture industry. He was born in January 1, 1904 at
Mandaluyong, a suburb of Manila in the Philippine Islands and died in October 5, 1987 at Palm Bay
Florida. He was also an art teacher and a fine-art painter.

Manuel Rey Isip emigrated from the Philippines to the United States in 1925 and settled in New York
City. He created portrait illustrations for newspapers and movie posters for Columbia Pictures and 20 th
Century Fox. In 1925 Manuel Isip left home and worked his passage on a boat to British Columbia in
Canada. He then traveled to Seattle, WA, to enter America and eventually settled in New York City,
where he lived in a cramped apartment with other recent immigrants at 106 Vermilyea Avenue, near
207th Street and Broadway in the Washington Heights section of Upper Manhattan. His works were
exhibited in September of 1954 at the Carnegie Endowment Center near the United Nations
Headquarters. The show featured the Associated Philippine Artists, and included Victorio Edades, Ben
Gonzales, Venancio Igarta, Jose Joya, Cesar Lagaspi, as well as his younger brother Pagsilang Rey Isip.

Among his work the “Fighting Filipinos” was the greatest contribution he had given in history. The
purpose of this work was to keep the Filipinos’ spirit up which was commissioned by the Philippine
commonwealth government in exile in the United States through a poster. It depicts a wounded Filipino
soldier about to hurl a grenade. With his left hand he holds aloft a Philippine flag -tattered but defiant-
with the red field up, signifying that the country is in a state of war.

Hernando Dizon

When Corazon Dizon Hernando was born on 12 December 1909, in Balanga, Bataan,
Philippines, her father, Natalio Hernando, was 36 and her mother, Policarpia Dizon, was 22. She
married Florencio Dela Pena Timbang in 1935, in Balanga, Bataan, Philippines. They were the parents of
at least 1 son and 1 daughter. She died on 5 November 1992, at the age of 82.

Emilio Rodriguez

Born in the colonial village of Sancti Spíritus, Cuba, in 1950. His family moved to La Habana in
1953. He started drawing and experimenting with oil paint and tempera at the age of 12. While a
student at the Instituto Pre-Universitario de Marianao (Marianao Senior High School), he participated in
several workshops sponsored by San Alejandro Arts Academy.

Between 1969 and 1970 he worked under the guidance of Cuban painter Jesús Antonio Valdovino Diaz
at a center for the visual arts run by Consejo Nacional de Cultura (National Council of Culture) located in
El Vedado, La Habana. In 1971 he enrolled in the University of Havana to study Pure Mathematics, but
after two years he changed the field to Computer Science, obtaining his degree in 1976. After graduation
he worked as a software specialist. In 1978 he began signing his artwork as “Emilio Héctor”. He left Cuba
permanently in 1981 and spent one year living in Paris. He moved to Miami, Florida, in 1982, where he
currently resides with his family. Upon arrival in Miami, he started working as a computer
analyst/programmer. He began painting with acrylic guided by the Cuban painter Dominica Alcántara in
2005 at the “Latin Quarter Cultural Center” in Miami. Abstract painting became his last interest and
passion. He has been painting abstracts since 2007. Emilio Héctor has been participating in the
workshops of renowned Cuban-American painters and professors Baruj Salinas and Yovani Bauta at
Miami Dade College. His work can be found in private and public collections in Florida as well as in other
states and countries of South America Europe and Asia.

In 2010 Emilio Héctor presented a group of abstract artists to commemorate a Century since the first
abstract artwork by Wassily Kandisnsky. This presentation later continued to become the “7 Plus One
Art Project” which has been presenting abstract art exhibitions in diverse institutions such as  Miami
Dade College, the Koubek Center, Saint Thomas University and the Miami Hispanic Cultural Arts Center.
Actually, Emilio Hector conducts this project as its founder and artistic director.