Viray, Earl Lorenz July 2, 2023

2020-08339/ARTS 1/5:30-7:00 Clod Marlan Krister Yambao

Is Peace just Silence?

As you examine the canvas, you are instantly drawn to the stark contrast in the value

of the elements within Katawhay sa Pangabuhi. Immediately, you are marveled by the

voluptuous yet angular female figure in her relaxed position lavishing with the privilege of

drinking wine and enjoying food (de Leon 84). Under her, seemingly inferior, are two

sakadas bearing two bundles of sugarcane held akin to a cross. All around them, blooming

outwards, are spikes inflicting pain to those that touch them. Underneath, they stand across

a land laden with thorns offering no solace to the sakadas. To their left, lies a child bearing a

newborn seemingly fused with one exposed skull. Behind them, a plume of smoke looms

rising to the top where there are flags on opposite sides, one being of Japan and the other a

more prominent US flag (San Juan). Lastly, a gray man holding flowers in a vase seemingly

reaches for the woman at the top, courting her.

Nunelucio Alvarado is a Negrense artist known for his depictions of the oppression

dealt towards the sakadas in his home province. This piece depicts the seemingly timeless

pain endured by the Negrense farmers under the influence of colonial powers and the

tyrannical rule of hacienderos (San Juan). The cross burdening the two sakadas symbolizes

the root cause of this pain, it being the hacienda system placed by the Christian Spaniards.

Hacienderos, following a semi-feudal state, had been further incentivized with the

mechanization of agricultural practices supported by the American state. In the

Commonwealth era came the passing of the Sugar Act ensuring stability in the sugar market

(Lopez-Gonzaga 55). However, the shift to high fructose corn syrup, the expiration of the

Laurel-Langley Pact at around 1970s-1980s, and the underreporting of profits of Marcos’

sugar crony led to the infamous Negros famine (Lopez-Gonzaga 55; Caña). This is eerily

depicted in Alvarado’s work by the infant and the child signifying the thousands of

malnourished children in their dying state. 190,000 sakadas working for the hacienderos

have been laid off from the various plantations around the island, cutting off the majority of

the island’s source of income fostered by the hacienderos’ adoption of monoculture

Viray, Earl Lorenz July 2, 2023
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agriculture (Caña; Reyes). All of these hardships are sustained by the relations of

imperialists with the local bourgeoisie.

One may ought to read unto the depiction of this relation in Alvarado’s work as one

wrought with quiet conflict, which incidentally is the topic of his artwork. Nunelucio Alvarado

challenges the definition of peace, as told by the title which can be translated to “A Peaceful

Way of Living” (Albay; San Juan). What is peace if not a condition of compromise?

Compromise that only one side has almost-complete control over the material conditions.

We can see the lack of interaction between the two dominating elements: the oppressor in

their heaven-like state and the oppressed distracted by their arduous labor. The domineering

state of the oppressor originally came from their land ownership, accumulating them and

profiting over the labor of the sakadas (San Juan). The thorns signify the landlessness of the

peasant folk, expressing the hardship of planting over soil they do not own. Cutting back to

the privileged, we witness a courtship between the gray man and the color-saturated

woman. The man fronting the US flag, colored as such to depict their physical absence yet

dominating presence in Negros, yearns for the help of the local elite to extend their

imperialist hold unto the Philippines’ labor market and hence, the peasant folk (San Juan).

Through the canvas, we witness the quiet conflict of the value, the colors, the oppressor, the

oppressed, yet what disturbs us most is the piercing stare of the two sakadas inciting our

involvement.
Viray, Earl Lorenz July 2, 2023
2020-08339/ARTS 1/5:30-7:00 Clod Marlan Krister Yambao
Works Cited

Albay, Rhick Lars Vladimer. "No sugarcoating." Panay News, [Iloilo City], 28 Oct. 2018,

www.panaynews.net/no-sugarcoating/.

Caña, Paul John. "Sugar Wars: Looking Back at the Negros Famine of the 1980s." Esquire

Philippines, 15 Apr. 2021,

www.esquiremag.ph/long-reads/features/negros-famine-of-the-1980s-a00289-20210

415-lfrm2.

De Leon, Felipe, Jr. "The Elements and the Principles of Organization in the Arts." pp.

83-96, drive.google.com/file/d/1SUroqHcBva09PM8Te5Nh1bFxXlI7yT8e/view.

Lopez-Gonzaga, Violeta. "View of Landlessness, Insurgency and the Food Crisis in

Negros." Kasarinlan, vol. 4, no. 1, 1988, pp. 53-59,

www.journals.upd.edu.ph/index.php/kasarinlan/article/view/652/654.

Reyes, Cid. "Nunelucio Alvarado and the courtship of ‘Babaye’." Lifestyle Inquirer, 14 Oct.

2013, lifestyle.inquirer.net/131247/nunelucio-alvarado-and-the-courtship-of-babaye/.

San Juan, Arthur David. "Pagtalunton sa Tereno ng Digma sa Isang Mapayapang

Pamumuhay." The Philippine Collegian, [Quezon City], 29 Oct. 2021,

phkule.org/article/388/pagtalunton-sa-tereno-ng-digma-sa-isang-mapayapang-pamu

muhay. Accessed 2 July 2023.

Viray, Earl Lorenz July 2, 2023
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Revelation

Looking at this landscape wrought with scrapes of green and the consequent

perturbations of black, set upon a background of yellow, what piques your attention is the

immediate isolation of two colors – red and violet. It is seemingly in a state of placelessness

but these are the immediate complementaries of the dominant colors of the painting (de

Leon 93). The consonance of the colors attribute to its timeliness, a subject of which the

artwork Deep Down You Already Know wants to accomplish. As an abstract expressionist,

Doctor Dennis “Sio” Montera owes his nonfigurative line of artworks to his journey in the

artworld (Montera; Guerrero; The Artling). This markedly meant Montera’s rejection of the

object and details upon his process-oriented style cognizant to the identity of the canvas to

an abstract expressionist, in the words of Harold Rosenberg (qtd. in Herbert 186) as a place

to act. We can see this act in Montera’s interview where he actively scrapes out layers of

paint and splatters and brushes new ones as he pleases (Montera). You can actively view

this in the image, although insufficiently, where a rhythmic progression of colors is marked by

the peeled-out layers of varying saturations of yellow ever-so contrasted with its analogous

green by streaks of tar Montera explicitly mentioned as part of his process. And in the heart

of this landscape-oriented piece lies blood red partially covered by multiple layers of acrylic.

Blood red, befitting of rage, of love, or of pain. Yet, in the end of his process, he splattered a

carefree violet, one that defied the hermetic conditions of shape and order. This forms as an

antithesis or alternatively, a progression to that of the other prominence, representing peace,

pride, or power. It holds significance to that of the red and violet.

We now look upon Montera’s inclinations and interests, of how his non-figurative art

should be analyzed. The direct and immediate reaction upon the sight of the artwork is what

abstract expressionists try to emulate, wanting to evoke their own emotions onto a canvas

(Paul). It is within this temporal moment we experience a connection with the artist. For what

abstract expressionists attempt is emulating universal experiences through their individuality

(Paul; Herbert 185-186). For instance, his past artworks have dealt with the physical and
Viray, Earl Lorenz July 2, 2023
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social isolation brought by the COVID-19 pandemic exhibited in Epicenter at Renaissance

(Guerrero; Reyes). Entailed with its universality comes the distinction of different analyses of

the piece, that its characteristic is its open-endedness (Cohen). If one were to impose upon

this, it would be up to their interpretation of the piece by the audience. And to my

inexperienced eye, this represents the manifestation of the hidden self, one that is as innate

and as vital as blood, which uncovers itself in the expression of our identity signified by the

playful streak and splotches of violet across the canvas and the ‘bleeding’ itself of the red.

The analogous nature of yellow to green brings forth the balance of warm and cool hues that

establishes its two-dimensionality reinforcing the same spatial space for the red and violet.

But this may prove insufficient to someone wanting to enjoy art as a form of protest or

as a reflection of culture or history at a certain period. Montera’s work, owing upon its roots,

is apolitical in its abstraction (Herbert 179). Rosenberg (qtd. in Herbert 185-186) additionally

uprooted this tradition upon the instances of individualistic culture perpetrated in the

superpower that is America. It provides an isolationist narrative that ultimately disregards

history but still owing upon the experiences an individual has lived. Art for art’s sake remains

autonomous in its production and lives outside of the political sphere (Herbert 187). A

rereading of this artwork for me, is the class struggle endured by the peasant folk in the

Philippines where human rights defenders are targeted by those in power. The array of

foliage and canopies overshadowed by the domineering power of the violet, of the military

and the government, blindly executing people just to reinforce the war-against-communism

narrative (Umali). If given an offer to represent the figures in a political landscape, this piece

can be portrayed under political art. However, its mere representation in a global art market

as an abstract expressionist art affects the views formed for what it is.
Viray, Earl Lorenz July 2, 2023
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Works Cited

The Artling. "Sio Montera." The Artling, theartling.com/en/artist/sio-montera/. Accessed 3

July 2023.

Cohen, Alina. "What Makes an Abstract Painting Good?" Artsy, 8 June 2023,

www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-abstract-painting-good. Accessed 3 July 2023.

Guerrero, V. G. "Prof. Dennis Montera Exhibits Creativity and World-Class Vision."

University of the Philippines Cebu, 11 Jan. 2021,

www.upcebu.edu.ph/creativity-and-world-class-vision-dennis-montera/.

Herbert, J. D. "The Political Origins of Abstract-Expressionist Art Criticism." Telos, vol. 1984,

no. 62, 1984, pp. 178-187, doi.org/10.3817/1284062178.

Montera, Dennis 'Sio'. "Inside the Studio: Dennis 'Sio' Montera." Interview by Qube Gallery.

Facebook, Qube Gallery, 18 July 2018,

www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2585401458152865.

Paul, Stella. "Abstract Expressionism." The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Oct. 2004,

www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/abex/hd_abex.htm. Accessed 3 July 2023.

Reyes, Cid. "Sio Montera's "Epicenter" at Renaissance." Renaissance Art PH,

www.renaissanceartph.com/epicenter. Accessed 3 July 2023.

Umali, Justin. "Fake encounters vs. Reds in Batangas result in 2 civilian deaths." Bulatlat,

www.bulatlat.com/2022/07/29/fake-encounters-vs-reds-in-batangas-result-in-2-civilia

n-deaths/.