Donsol paintings impart lessons

03 January 2007

THROUGH THE PAINTBRUSH, A GROUP OF artists in this town found a way to help protect and preserve the environment and the local heritage.

For visual artist Bats Elarmo, painting the canvas with colors in his front yard is a better medium for him to effectively express his views on environment conservation.

Elarmo says while he paints, he welcomes onlookers from among his neighbors and passersby along San Jose Street here, where he lives. And from there, a forum begins, even with no one talking.

Whenever he paints, Elarmo says he believes the spectators behind him do not just watch, but also react—quietly or noisily.

He is part of the group “Artists for Environment” or “ArtE,” which was formed in 2005 with the mission of reminding and moving people by means of art to take care of the environment.

Saving natural wonders is an agenda for the people of Donsol, who have come to rely on ecological tourism to alleviate poverty in the third-class municipality.

Having the most recorded whale shark sightings than anywhere else, Donsol’s popularity as the “whale shark capital of the world” continues to grow.

Elarmo says the ArtE members draw inspiration from the butanding (whale shark), for which their hometown is known.

The idea of forming the ArtE came during the town’s annual mural painting contest at the Butanding Festival held every April.

The contestants who joined the event in 2005 later formed a group which was then called “Garasapgasap,” a Bicol term that denotes roughness.

Murals in town

“We were a group of 10, mostly out-of-school youth who could not afford college education,” says Elarmo.

Murals are noticeable masterpieces in the town proper of Donsol.

And they have a common message: To preserve the whale shark by protecting its habitat from illegal fishing and other forms of marine destruction.

In the coastal village of Dangcalan, where the Julia Campbell Ecology Center was built, murals painted by high school students on concrete fence stand as examples.

One work shows a school of fish and other marine creatures, like the butanding, holding placards as they protest illegal fishing.

Emmanuel Climaco, 18, one of the members of ArtE, says he started painting when he was 5 years old using a piece of stick as paintbrush and the soil as canvas.

He claims he was inspired by the success of other artists who also started painting as a hobby until they developed it into a craft now appreciated by many.

Climaco’s membership in ArtE prompted him to paint “Today’s tycoon, tomorrow’s pauper,” an abstract painting on climate change.

Last June 26, Climaco painted “Ozone,” which speaks about the depletion of the ozone layer due to harmful greenhouse gas emissions.

Elarmo says the talks given by environment groups like Greenpeace and community projects by individuals like Julia Campbell, who lived in Donsol briefly, helped foster environmental awareness among the artists.

Campbell was a US peace corps volunteer assigned in Bicol. She was murdered in Batad village in Ifugao province, where her body was found in a shallow grave on April 18 last year.

Her undertakings as peace corps volunteer, including her environmental projects and reading program for children, are recorded in her blog, www.juliainthephilippines.blogspot.com.

Campbell built a marine ecology center named “Bahay Kalikasan” (Nature House) at the coast of Barangay Dangcalan.

It serves as a community center on environmental protection where seminars on environmental science for children and solid waste management for adults are held.

Heritage preservation

Another artist, Cesar Gueta, a native of Monreal, Masbate, paints heritage sites in Albay—like old churches and old houses, to help preserve their value.

Gueta, 36, is an instructor at the department of architecture in Aquinas University in Legazpi City.

In an exhibit on Dec. 1-10, 2006, entitled “Life paintings: My heritage, your heritage, our heritage,” Gueta displayed 34 artworks he painted in one year.

Gueta says he was inspired to paint heritage-related themes when the Aquinas University College of Arts and Sciences pioneered research work on heritage houses.

“In the research, our school used digital documentation of the sites. I thought it would be a good idea to convert the photographs into paintings to help gain more interest from people,” Gueta says.

Among the heritage sites he has painted is the Our Lady of the Gate Parish in Daraga, Albay, an 18th century baroque church on a hill offering views of the Albay Gulf and the Mayon Volcano.

He also painted the famous Cagsawa belfry and ruins, where many people taking shelter during Mt. Mayon’s 1814 eruption died, and the parish church of San Juan Bautista in Tabaco, Albay, which was built in the 19th Century.

He also painted the ancestral house of renowned poet Angela Manalang-Gloria in Tabaco City, where historical markers were recently placed by the National Historical Institute, the Rosales and Nolasco houses in Camalig town—all of which are “bahay na bato” (stone houses) probably built in the early 1900s.

Also among Gueta’s favorite subjects are marketplaces.

He says these, too, can be considered part of heritage.

“But now with the fast-rising malls and modern bazaars, traditional marketplaces have become less popular. It will be good to preserve them, too, through my paintings,” Gueta says.

Most of the Bicol artists are continuously seeking avenues to popularize their works.

These painters say that the lack of support from the government and a appreciation from the people can be a drawback but since they paint for a cause, just like a waning heritage or some endangered fish species, they all persist to survive. Ephraim Aguilar, Inquirer Southern Luzon