Vicente Manansala, 1910-1981: National Artist

In Essays by pcan

Painting was his lifeblood, as it was his long love and demanding mistress. Vicente Manansala pursued his artistic career with a singlemindedness of purpose, knowing art to be his own …

Abstract and/or Figurative: A Wrong Choice

In Essays by pcan

The recent series, “Abstract Art and the Masses” by Domingo Castro de Guzman, has given rise to a number of reflections that have a bearing on the question of art …

The Social Form of Art

In Essays by pcan

The criticism of Alice Guillermo presents an instance in which the encounter of the work of art resists a series of possible alienations even as it profoundly acknowledges the integrity …

CCP Museum: The First Five Years

In Essays by pcan

As late as three years back, I would meet long-lost friends at the CCP lobby who still ask, “What, you have art galleries here?” as though the CCP Museum of …

Place of Region in the Contemporary

In Essays by pcan

In this incipient moment, PCAN is shaped by the concerns and anxieties implicated in the phrase “Place of Region in the Contemporary.” It is a deliberately elusive term, the better …

Developmental Art of the Philippines

In Essays by pcan

About ten years ago, or just about the time when Philippine art saw a new home at the Cultural Center of the Philippines, a program of activities in the form …

“Roots, Basics, Beginnings”

In Essays by pcan

By Patrick D. Flores To introduce the writing and the textual work of Raymundo Albano (1947-1985) is to sort of glide across terrains of “serious games.” Serious because Albano ponders. …