Oro, Plata, Mata at Et Nos Gallery

Oro, Plata, Mata at Et Nos Gallery is an all sculpture works by Ilonggo artists.

The show was opened September 18, 2018 with Ed Defensor and Alfredo Esquillo as opening program guests.

Oro, Plata Mata at Et Nos Gallery, Angelicum School Iloilo, September 2018.

The title of the art show also serves as a good reminder of the famous 1982 historical war drama by Peque Gallaga set in Negros.

Also showed at Et Nos Gallery: Kubyal – An art exhibit that herald childhood play

The art show presents the works of Momo Dalisay, PG Zoluaga, Arel Distor Zambarrano, Macouy Mark Gonzales, Martin Genodepa, Jun Orland E. Espinosa, Tyrone Dave Espinosa, Jeanroll Ejar, Anthony Castillo, Jounin Sumile, Alan Cabalfin, Jonas Mark Siva, Nelmar Ejar, and Antonio Anas, Jr.

ORO PLATA MATA

by Joar Su

“welded by blood

sculpted through pain

molded in tears

shaped by heart”

One should not dismiss this popular Filipino ritual of building a house, an alternate counting of stair steps in a chant of “Oro, Plata, Mata” – gold, silver, death – where it is believed that the last step should be Oro or Plata or else misfortune and death will have its entrance to the household brought by the spell of Mata.

However, in this sculpture exhibition the original domestic chant has been borrowed to deliver a new concept, a celebration of this form of art presented by both established and emerging Ilonggo sculptors that will provide re-birth of the artistic genes developed from the womb of mortal artistry and imaginative invention.

Changing styles and distinctive expressions that showcase no other but pure humane living- both the good and the bad, whatever the artist could decipher or suppress between his bosom in his/her process of breathing new life to his/her masterpiece through the dynamic mediums the hand could invent or transform.

The Oro

Sculpture could be regarded as a present day gold regardless of the raw materials used. For centuries it has become an essential marker of the moving time. Every historical accounts of human relationship and nature, the flight of an aging world had been preserved in the inventory of aesthetic /visual journalism.

Also see the works of Arel Zambarrano in Flexible Nerves

This Oro of our time took the unparalleled role of becoming the guiding cane for communication, gesturial languages for connection and detachment, silent visual protests that is all between the palm of a mighty sculptor.

The Plata

Doubt or guess, sculptors are the noted silversmiths in the process of art. They were the chosen few cursed to bleed in open wounds behind dark and solitary spaces, cursed or blessed with extraordinary amount of senses to listen and see more of the average ray.

They were given special abilities in the guise of vulnerability; exceptional sensitivity to transport everything by hand into tangible pieces breathed drawn from their silver insides.

The Mata

There is only a handful of Ilonggo artists dedicating their lives into sculpture. There could be an arising fear that this visual art form will end. But it won’t end.

There is some form of slow but impressive movement happening today. Genodepa, Zoluaga, Cabalfin, Dalisay, Gonzales, Anas, Siva and Zambarrano had already devoted decades of their lives into this vocation cementing their names in this field while continuing to inspire emerging Ilonggo sculptors

Castillo, Sumile, the Espinosas and Ejar families had been establishing a following for producing artworks too strong and brutal for their ages.

Oro, Plata, Mata. Now in present Iloilo, a slow but steady movement of collective liberation is happening. Like the ritual of stair-making, only gold and silver but no death to the art.