Friday, April 17, 2015

EXPOSING THE FACE IN THE AGE OF MEMES





EXPOSING THE FACE IN THE AGE OF MEMES
(or do you really need to use a photograph to drive a point)
17 April 2015


“As a visual artist, one cannot run away from storytelling.” That statement was part of the exhibition notes/curatorial statement I wrote for my seventh one-man exhibition titled Dramatis Personae held at the Baguio Museum in January 2014. In the said exhibition, I mounted a series of paintings which I assembled as a cast of characters as each character becomes the storyteller by themselves. I focused on the face as the main platform of the exhibition because I believe that the face is a dominant and influential instrument of interaction and communication.

So much faces were used as models by artists of the past and the present. The most prominent remains to be that of Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci. Yet know ones know the real person behind the face of the Mona Lisa even until da Vinci’s death. It took centuries to learn that it was that of Lisa of Gioconda. Rembrandt, the Dutch master, became very notable with his portraiture. To trim down a list of masters who used faces as subjects would be hard but that would include Van Dyke, Sir Henry Raeburn, Ingres, J. L. Davis, William McGregor Paxton and William Adolpe Bouguereau. Carravagio painted the much-talked about Girl with the Pearl Earring. Who owns the face of the girl? It was Carravagio’s “housemaid.” So popular was the painting that a cinematic rendition with the same title was released and Scarlet Johansson played the part. Time and again artists would attempt to paint a rendition of the face of Jesus although his face was never really recorded.

Wednesday, April 15, 2015

THE SUBSTANCE OF EXECUTIVE ORDER NO. 1





THE SUBSTANCE OF EXECUTIVE ORDER NO. 1
15 April 2015


Statement of the Problem.
What is wrong with Executive Order No. 1?

Know the facts.
At the onset, three things must be clearly understood. First, the 2001 Revised Constitution of the University of the East Studentry is defective and is in urgent need of amending. It is the reason why Kapit-Bisig ng Mag-aaral sa Pamantasan ng Silangan (KAMPS), otherwise known as Kapit-Bisig, started to actively initiate the call to amend. Second, the current 2001 Constitution which superceded the 1987 Studentry Constitution was clearly patterned after the Kapit-Bisig ng Party Alliance Constitution (KBPA) of the late 80s. Nobody uses the phase “nationalist, scientific and mass-oriented system of education” during that time except those who have been branded as “activists and militants.” Third, the first student council constitution was approved in a plebiscite by the studentry in 10 August 1983, Wednesday, under the term of Kapit-Bisig standard bearer and now Congressman Ben Evardone (see DAWN, Vol. XVII No. 6). That success can only be claimed by the Alyansa ng Mag-aaral sa Pamantasan ng Silangan (AMPS) and the Kapit-Bisig ng Mag-aaral at Sambayanan which is the original name of Kapit-Bisig. Both organizations became the backbone of the present UE Kapit-Bisig Alumni Association Inc.

AMEND THE UESC CONSTITUTION

AMEND THE UESC CONSTITUTION