Each of this year’s Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) Thirteen Artists Awards (TAA) recipients are reinventing what it means to be a modern Philippine artist.
Out of a record high of 108 submitted artists’ portfolios, CCP and its Visual Arts and Museum Division (VAMD), along with this year’s selection committee, selected the thirteen artists to be included in the TAA’s triennial awarding on December 5.
This year’s selection committee, composed of past TAA recipients Phyllis Zaballero (1978), Antipas Delotavo (1990), Buen Calubayan (2009), Wawi Navarroza (2012), and CCP VAMD officer-in-charge Rica Estrada Uson, selected artists whose oeuvres responded critically to modern-day realities and who demonstrated consistent art practices that engaged with contemporary visual forms.
First started in 1970 as a curatorial project by then-CCP curator Roberto Chabet, the TAA was established with the purpose of honoring Filipino artists who “restructure, restrengthen, and renew artmaking and art thinking,” according to the CCP’s official website. Chabet had been inspired by National Artist Victorio Edades’ “Thirteen Moderns,” a concept which grouped the modernist artists who broke from pre-war classical conventions and revolutionized the country’s artistic style. This group includes legends such as Anita Magsaysay-Ho, Vicente Manansala, and Victorio Edades, among others. Since then, the TAA has been granted to artistic mavericks such as National Artist BenCab, renowned sculptor Eduardo Castrillo, and mixed media artist Leeroy New.
Rolling Stone Philippines takes a closer look at who these awardees are and the cultural impact they are making.
Ella Mendoza
Although Manila-based ceramic artist Ella Mendoza began her artistic career producing functional wares, she has since evolved her craft to experimenting with conceptual, sculptural, and installation ceramic pieces. Her first solo exhibition, For Your Convenience, explored the connection between consumerist culture and art history, focusing specifically on the creation of mass-produced food packaging materials such as sachets, tin cans, plastic bottles, and more. Beyond her own practice, Mendoza has helped organize international ceramic events, such as Tropical Blaze and Paglulual, which showcase the ceramic works of local artists.
Jel Suarez
Based in Bacolod City, the self-taught visual artist Jel Suarez is known for creating collages of natural objects, such as salvaged materials, stones, and paper in order to mimic cartographic landscapes that ask viewers to consider their relationship with the land around them. Suarez is a recipient of the Ateneo Art Awards – Embassy of Italy Purchase Prize (2018) and was shortlisted for the Ateneo Art Awards – Fernando Zóbel Prizes for Visual Art (2021 and 2019).
Liv Vinluan
For over sixteen years, visual artist Liv Vinluan has exhibited artwork that explores the bridge between fantasy and reality. Vinluan’s pieces often examine what it means to be conventional, such as in her recent installation Possibly a Million Discarded Brushstrokes from Year 2015 to 2021, a collage of the artist’s stained painting rags that restructures the gallery as a place of hands-on production and art-making. Vinluan was shortlisted for the Ateneo Art Awards – Fernando Zóbel Prize for Visual Art in 2016.
Denver Garza
Creating multidisciplinary art that investigates beliefs, psychological states, and the human experience, mental-health-worker-turned-artist Denver Garza aims to ask viewers to take a psychosocial lens and examine their own identities. Garza has showcased his art in exhibitions across the country, such as in popular art festivals like Art in the Park.
Issay Rodriguez
Interdisciplinary artist Issay Rodriguez aims to create work that focuses on ecology and humanity. Her portfolio, which includes installations, drawings, prints, and multimedia pieces, explore the connection between memories, places, and human interactions. Beyond her art, Rodriguez teaches at the University of the Philippines Diliman and is a trustee for both the Philippine Native Plants Conservation Society Inc. and the Philippine Botanical Art Society.
Derek Tumala
Manila-based visual artist Derek Tumala centers his artistic practice on industrial materials, moving imagery, and emerging technologies. He considers how technology can be used to add a layer of meaning to already existing artwork, such as in his web application OBSERVATORYO, where Tumala digitally recreates the Jesuit-founded Manila Observatory to explore the institution’s colonial history while also thinking about its role in advancing research. Tumala’s work has been exhibited in important venues such as the Museum of Contemporary Art & Design – Manila and Art Basel Hong Kong.
Catalina Africa
Based in Aurora Province, multidisciplinary artist Catalina Africa creates dreamy, ethereal landscapes using a variety of mediums, including painting, sculpture, and video. Africa envisions a landscape where spells, songs, prayers, and love letters are visualized, paying homage to themes of mysticism and magic. Africa has displayed her work in a number of exhibitions, including recent shows such as Shrines in 2023 and Spiralling in Starlight Vision in 2022.
Tekla Tamoria
Ma. Athela “Tekla” Tamoria left her corporate career to pursue her passion of textile design. Her artistic style is often playful and colorful, exploring how materials, particularly paper, can be used to create largescale intricate artworks. In 2023, Tamoria received the Ateneo Art Awards – Fernando Zóbel Prize for Visual Art and has exhibited her work in several art fairs and museum shows in both Japan and the Philippines.
Russ Ligtas
With an artistic career that has spanned over two decades, multidisciplinary artist and performer Russ Ligtas has developed a body of work that explores the Filipino identity as an amalgamation of alter egos, blending together themes from mythology, folklore, and reality. The New York-based artist has explored a number of mediums, such as performance art, painting, choreography, and film.
Henrielle Pagkaliwangan
The Cavite-born artist Henrielle Baltazar Pagkaliwangan uses her hand-pulled prints and drawings to examine materialist culture and its connection to Philippine history. She has also delved into the mediums of ink and watercolor, such as in her taxonomic piece Field Notes for Papa Isio, which earned her the grand prize in 2017’s Don Papa Art Competition. She has exhibited her art across the country, as well as in Taiwan, Korea, and Indonesia.
Joshua Serafin
Now based in Brussels, multidisciplinary artist Joshua Serafin uses their love of choreography, performance, and visual arts to navigate themes of transmigration and queer politics. Serafin unpacks the concept of Otherness, bringing awareness to the historical violence attached to it. They have been included in exhibitions across the globe, such as in Singapore, Finland, Brussels, Hong Kong, Berlin, and Mexico. This year, they participated in the 60th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia.
Vien Valencia
Archival artist Vien Valencia uses his artistic platform to display the beauty of traditional methods of archiving. He takes the theme of archival work and links it to community, time, and anthropology, while also exploring the impact of social and environmental issues. In 2023, Valencia received the Ateneo Art Awards – Fernando Zóbel Prize for Visual Art.
Luis Antonio Santos
Luis Antonio Santos is a visual artist based in Quezon City and whose practice explores the themes of entropy, isolation, memory, and longing through the mediums of painting and photography. Santos uses printwork, oil painting, and image manipulation to consider the fluidity of memory and how this links to the human psyche. Santos has received multiple accolades for his work, including the Ateneo Art Awards – Embassy of Italy Purchase Prize (2023) and the Ateneo Art Awards – Fernando Zóbel Prize for Visual Art (2023).
