Mars Bugaoan
January  —  December 2020

Mars Bugaoan (b.1988) received his cum laude degree in Fine Arts major in Advertising from the University of Santo Tomas College of Fine Arts and Design. Since 2016 he has presented solo exhibitions at Kapitana Gallery, Artinformal, Vinyl on Vinyl, Art Cube, and Pinto Art Museum, and was shortlisted for the Ateneo Art Awards in 2018 and 2021. He was a participant of the Bellas Artes Projects Namamahay Flash Residency in Bataan, the ABungalow Residency Project in Negros Occidental, as well as the Pasaload Online Residency by Load Na Dito Projects. Bugaoan tells stories of impermanence, survival, and of vulnerability alongside power by experimenting, manipulating, and transforming found or discarded everyday objects. In 2021, he was one of the recipients of the 13 Artists Awards from the Cultural Center of the Philippines.



I - The Decision, The Residency, The Process

The decision to apply and schedule a residency in the first quarter of 2020 was an intended break from my busy life in Manila. I was thinking of a new experience in the form of an artist residency. Things have to be scheduled, and in order to focus I took a hiatus from my MFA and part time teaching job.

The Abungalow Artist residency appealed to me because it provided a "space for the artists to create works that in some ways relate the surroundings and their actual impression of the vista and culture of the island of Negros into the artist’s perspective."

The first month of the residency involved immersing myself in the locale and how will the flow of production will be, to stimulate engagement with places and people, as well as experiences and images that could initiate the flow of creation. Familiarizing myself with the available materials was also necessary. I explored upholstery, general merchandise, school supplies and hardware stores. The show also explored using the banana leaf as a medium, as well as a surface for printmaking, which eventually extended into a time-based video work.

The works grew organically since creating my first banana leaf sculpture of a traced segment from a whole leaf by using wire mesh and plastic up to experimenting with the banana leaf as a print surface. Days of observation led to "Under The Same Star" a 49.5 inches in diameter installation of rubbercut print on banana leaves, shot over a span of 8 days.

Using the previous matrix that featured a detail of a melted plastic work, I also made impressions on Manila paper, presented as a wall-bound piece juxtaposed with the entire stack of the edition of 50 prints. The carved matrix was made from rubber commonly used for car mud guards, was also exhibited as a sculptural work, "Padayon".

Negros is filled with breathtaking landcapes which i rendered in what I would call "implasto", referencing photos that I took during solo explorations and trips with my host and friends. The process involves using wire mesh or chicken wire as armature while slowly building up the desired image by melting plastic vinyl across the surface with the heat gun, treating plastic as paint, layering textures as I go. The same "implasto" technique was applied in creating 3 large leaf sculptures, actual traces of banana leaves from the Abungalow garden.

II - The Covid Lockdown and Going Online

I remember during the final production week for the culminating exhibition, lock down was declared in Manila, and Negros island was also to declare lockdown in the following weeks which would coincide with the opening date of the show. I told the residency director that what I can do is to finish the banana leaf installation and keep it with all the other works, and to stage the show in the future when everything is ok.

When Covid 19 and the lockdown happened, it became disorienting while attempting to finish works for a show. But I guess that helped me realign my thoughts with what i had to finish rather than taking up too much space for thoughts about the pandemic. The first decision put the show on hold didnt feel right and i just had to trust my instincts and continue installing the exhibition. Given that at this time shows were only getting cancelled or postponed, not many options for holding online shows have become available, hence it was decided to present the exhibition online as a facebook album. The show progressed to be "musings on the rural landscape, pritnmaking interventions on new media, and plastic constructions revolving around the musa or banana plant. On April 2, 2020, the exhibition opened online as a response to the current health situation, both to allow safety in distance, and continue sharing art in its spirit beyond physical distance."

III -… ¼ ½ Disapper Appear

The title captures different stages of change, a game of alertness in the utterance of words synchronized with quick hand gestures. "Appear Disappear 1/2 1/4" may be remembered as an exhibition but I will remember it as a question that brought me to realize that by looking at my previous life from afar, there are necessary adjustments and recalibrations just like what the pandemic has instilled in us. In this exhibition, time had become a medium on its own, as the show relied on it - should it appear now, or disappear for later?

“Appear Disappear 1/2 1/4" affirms the cycle of life, the fractions of possibilities, and the uncertainty of the human condition as revealed through a child's game.


WORKSHOP ︎︎︎

Appear Disappear 1/2 1/4

02.04.2020
Kapitana Gallery

A child’s game of accuracy and speed. It is a simple cycle of decreasing and increasing intensities, until one falters and the game starts again. Why don’t we sit and listen?

“Appear, Disappear!”

Time plays an integral role, there is a central installation - a work that needs time, and does not wait for it. The banana leaf as an alternative printmaking surface is like paper - receptive to ink and image, and on its own dries, browns, and brittles - akin to paper over centuries. The image in the print is a close up detail of an old work - which in this manner evokes an imprint, like a thumbmark. Instinctive as the subject selection was, it nonetheless looks up to time - a flowing dance that vanishes with each second past, contained within the measured passing of days. A variety of cuts and trims are arranged in a circular formation. Then time does its part, and the full circle becomes remnants scattered, like constellations in the night sky.

As contrast to the evolving nature of the organic, it is complemented by an installation of similar, blown-up prints, this time on manila paper. If the banana leaf turns from green to yellow to brown, the paper is in a constant state: it yellowness a mark of its processed nature. Originally planned on clean, flat sheets, the lack of such readymade led to an epiphany of more layers and dimensions. Interestingly, yellow is a color that circles back to the artist’s first exhibition.

“One-half, One-fourth!”

Now the artist would not have come across the unassuming banana plant if it not were for his habitual explorations. In these moments, he took note of the landscapes, skyscapes, and all interesting imagery under the Negros sun. He used these to investigate a transition in a very traditional painting genre - the landscape.

The process was like painting, in the way plastic is slated across chicken wire - like blobs of paint. The way he has wielded plastic as a medium has made viewers think they were looking at paint worked in thick strokes. From that analogy one might call it “impasto,” but one of the artist’s friends has coined a more appropriate “implasto” to refer to this medium and technique. From this highly “representational” approach, Bugaoan subjects the plastic to a heat gun, hereby “melting away” the recognizable and steering the work into the realm of abstraction. A further push is given by crumpling the wires, pushing the limits of a once flat dimension.

In an act of representation, or possibly a simulation, banana leaves are recreated in plastic. The way that the leaves naturally break apart, twist, turn, and tear are somehow inherent in the plastic reaction to heat. Like traces seen through wire mesh and plastic, they become tactile and permanent reminders of temporality. These recollections flow from process to practice, constantly in transition.

“!”

All organisms decay, time moves forward still. Plants wither, paper ages, prints disappear as ink breaks down. Relativity states that one object can have different views and interpretations. Life is a game, and it doesn’t stop and wait for human frivolity. Despite its reference to play and innocence, the exhibition also stands as a reminder of a diminishing return: life and death already hold sway over the balance of human life, but adding fear, change, and uncertainty makes one feel smaller and smaller as an already tiny fragment of time, space, reality, and the universe at large.