Quattro
Group Exhibition of Eileen Bondoc-Escueta, Irma Lara, Minda Ventanilla, and Jo Uygongco
3 to 17 October 2018
ArtistSpace, Ayala Museum
On 3 October 2018, ArtistSpace presents QUATTRO, the group exhibition of visual artists Eileen Bondoc-Escueta, Irma Lara, Minda Ventanilla, and Jo Uygongco.
Have numerologists truly favored the number four? Sure, there is a lucky seven, and an ominous thirteen, and three (a love triangle?) is rife with tension and competition. But undeniably the arts and music have found a cohesive and convivial character in the number four. Witness alone the changing of the weather in a yearly sequence of seasons: winter, spring, summer, autumn or fall. Not only the climate but classical music has bequeathed to us Antonio Vivaldi’s sparkling “Four Seasons.” And who better to render this music but a string quartet composed of two violinists, a cellist, and a viola player?
And then there are the Four Temperaments which are dimensions of human behavior. To wit: Sanguine (lively, optimistic, buoyant); Phlegmatic (people person, loyal spouse); Choleric (goal-oriented, analytical, logical), and Melancholic (loves tradition, does not seek novelty or adventure). Most individuals, however, have mixed temperaments, so we who are untrained enthusiasts cannot judge solely by appearance.
And yet – interestingly – Quattro can tantalize us into analyzing the personalities of the artworks by the four participating artists namely Eileen Bondoc-Escueta, Irma Lara, Minda Ventanilla, and Jo Uygongco. Indeed, it is a line from their Artist Statement which triggered this provocative analysis: “The time has come for this band of different personalities to showcase their newfound passion.”
By virtue of having launched the Artists Studio based in Fullybooked in Greenbelt Mall, Eileen has perforce become the group’s rallying and inspirational figure. The varied backgrounds of the impressive number of students, beginners as well as veterans, who have attended Eileen’s painting workshops attest to the redemptive power of art. Bankers, corporate executives, marketing specialists, business entrepreneurs, lawyers, architects, and designers have all heeded the clarion call of “art”. It was Eileen who had conceived Quattro as an all-women quartet of artists brought together “by fate or accident” into one happy blend of harmonious artmaking. And now, bearing in mind, that artists too have mixed temperaments, perhaps part serene and part assertive, part intuitive and part analytic. We can see how their works evoke the subtle strains of their individual sensibilities, and in what ways their works may unconsciously intersect and connect.
For Eileen Bondoc-Escueta, watercolor has ever been the medium of favor and choice. Conducive is the gentle handling of her brushstroke which coaxes to come to light her images of delightful koi fish. But regard how the fierce look of an eagle can be mollified into a wizened stare by the sheer delicacy of pigments thinning into shadows. A foliage of jasmine blossoms seems to twinkle from the undergrowth; a burnished cluster of coconuts is imperiously perched atop an unreachable tree.
Irma Lara shares Eileen’s fascination with the sensuously gliding koi. She favors, however a more expressionist handling of the brush, where the physicality of the pigments are manifest, almost as if she were animating the forms into life. An element of fantasy, however, graces her works, notably where a woman’s comely face is made more alive in the presence of orchid blooms. The stillness of a sunset is equally a vivid experience for Irma.
Indeed, a sunset too is an inevitable presence in the works of Minda Ventanilla. This time, however, serenity has given way to a blazing fervor, as if her skies were on fire. Her floral blooms, too, are in searing red, applied in impastos that set the work in tension against the delicacy of the flowers. Yet, Minda can surprise with a soft-focus, almost mistily evanescent hibiscus bloom, where the passionate reds recede into the shyest shades of pinks.
While the floral images are distinctly representational, Jo Uygongco opts for a more abstract rendition of her works. Her lone orchid seems like a brief foray but still it is a marvel of marbling effects. Most of her works partake of this marbling technique, allowing the slowly coagulating pigments to merge into the most lava-like blending of colors. The pace is slow, flowing, meandering, as if seeking its own final destination, and stops fairly short of dominating the space.
Hence, Quattro is a performance and a projection of four women’s passion for art, which no matter how late the calling, is more than just an act of making up for lost time, engendering regret and guilt. Did they discover art, or is it the other way around? Like the four seasons and the four temperaments, these four women artists – Eileen, Irma, Minda and Jo – have had the good fortune of an ideal kinship, of finding the right time and place for the maturation of their selves and spirits.
The article was written by Mr. Cid Reyes who is the author of choice of National Artists Arturo Luz, BenCab, J. Elizalde Navarro, and Napoleon V. Abueva. A prolific writer, he has written/co-written over forty art books. Reyes received the “Best in Criticism Award” from the Art Association of the Philippines (AAP).
About the Artist
Eileen Bondoc-Escueta (born 1953) graduated with a degree in AB Psychology, and took her MBA studies at the Ateneo Graduate School of Business. For more than twenty years, she worked as an HR Consultant in the field of Human Resource Management and Development. She is a Certified Master Trainor with Development Dimensions International (DDI), an American company. She started painting as a hobby almost thirty years ago. She had a painting juried in five International Watercolor Society (IWS) Biennale exhibitions in Hong Kong, Albania, Indonesia, Bangladesh, and Italy in the past three years. She juried in the annual IWS-Philippines Watercolor Exhibition in GSIS Museo ng Sining in 2017 and 2018. She participated in Urban Sketchers Symposium in Singapore in 2015. She started teaching and conducting painting workshops more than twenty years ago. She has had six solo exhibitions, and has participated in various group exhibitions. At present, she has retired from the corporate scene, and is an actively an art educator, and a full-time artist.
Irma Lara was born in 1958. Life took over the artist, and Irma ended up in a bank for some thirty-odd years, finally breaking away to find her way back to art. She has been drawing and painting in various mediums for the past five years. She had paintings juried in three IWS Biennale exhibitions in Hong Kong, Albania, and Indonesia in the past two years, and IWS-Philippines Watercolor Convention and Exhibit in GSIS Museo ng Sining in 2017. She participated in Art in the Park with Agos Kulay ng Maynila in 2017, and Urban Sketchers Symposium in Singapore in 2015. She has joined six group exhibitions since 2015.
Minda Ventanilla (born 1951) is the President and Chief Executive Officer of Demontfort Labels Corporation, a printing company that caters to the printing needs of some top businesses in the Philippines. She took up painting under the tutelage of Eileen Bondoc-Escueta, and has been painting for more than three years. She had paintings juried in three IWS Biennale exhibitions in Hong Kong, Albania, and Indonesia in the past two years, and IWS-Philippines Watercolor Convention and Exhibit in GSIS Museo ng Sining in 2017. She participated in the Urban Sketcher Symposium in Singapore in 2015. She has joined four group exhibitions since 2015.
Jo Uygongco (born 1968) is a business entrepreneur. She grew up doodling on scratch papers laying around. Her artistic streak is influenced by her father, Eduardo Uygongco, a visual artist. She has been sketching and drawing all her life but she only started full-time painting in 2014. She had a painting juried in three IWS Biennale exhibitions in Hong Kong, Albania, and Indonesia in the past two years, and IWS-Philippines Watercolor Convention and Exhibit in GSIS Museo ng Sining in 2017. She participated in the First Philippine Watercolor Convention’s On-the-Spot Watercolor Competition at GSIS Museo ng Sining, Art in the Park with Agos Kulay ng Maynila in 2017, and Urban Sketchers Symposium in Singapore in 2015. She has joined six group exhibitions since 2015.
QUATTRO will be on view at the ArtistSpace from 3 to 17 October 2018. ArtistSpace is located at the Ayala Museum Annex, Ground Level, Makati Avenue corner De La Rosa Street, Makati City. It is open from Mondays to Sundays, 10 AM to 7 PM. Admission is free.
For more information, please call or e-mail Jane Salvador at (02) 759-8288 | artistspace@ayalamuseum.org or Jo Uygongco at jouygongco@gmail.com.