The first ever Mindanao Art Fair, Exhibit, and Conference (MindanaoArt 2019) slated this October 4-6, 2019 gathers not just Mindanao artists at the Gaisano Mall of Davao Atrium but also brings in personalities who have made their name in visual arts from all over the country to share their knowledge in the MindanaoArtTalks to be held at the Philippine Women’s College of Davao RSM Event Center on October 5, 2019, Saturday.
The conference is open to the public on a first-come first-served seating arrangement.
MindanaoArtTalks is the conference component of MindanaoArt organized by Lawig-Diwa Inc. through a grant by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts National Committee on Art Galleries (NCCA-NCAG).
The whole-day conference will be keynoted by Vim Nadera, an award-winning poet, fictionist, playwright and essayist, who will set the tone that art transcends all media and will stress the importance of interdisciplinary approach among and within the arts. The youngest director of the UP Institute of Creative Writing, Nadera pioneered poetry therapy in the country and the first expressive art workshop in Asia.
The first panel tackles “Artist Developing Audience” with Cid Reyes (art Criticism), Atty Elba Cruz (curation) and Gerry Leonardo (art education) with PWC prof. Wilfred Dexter “Rob’’ G. Tanedo as moderator.
Reyes is the best known art critic in the country and has authored and co-authored nearly 40 books on art. Cruz is a certified curator by Sotheby’s Institute of Art in New York. While Leonardo is a visual arts special education teacher
at the Philippine High School for the Arts in Makiling.
The topic “Artist Curating Self” takes centerstage in the second panel with Leeroy New (Art Installation), Dominic Rubio (History as Subject Matter), and Rosalie Zerrudo (Artist Collaborating with communities) and discuss through their art practice the conscious and unconscious “motions” of “curating the self”. The panel is moderated by Professor Pamela Castrillo of Ateneo de Davao University.
New hails from General Santos and is regarded as one of the top Filipino contemporary installation artist but who became more popular for the muscle dress worn by Lady Gaga in her music video, Marry The Night, which he co-designed with Kermit Tesoro. Rubio is among few artists most sought after by collectors who spent a few years perfecting his art here in Davao City. While Rosalie Zerrudo is the mover behind Inday Dolls, the creations of female inmates in Iloilo City, who earned her masters in educational theater at the New York University.
The last panel ”Artist Selling Self” moderated by PWC’s art educator Professor Emi Englis, where the guests discuss the business of selling visual arts with Jack Teotico (Gallery Business Practitioner), Riel Hilario (Artist residency), Pope Dalisay (Art Competitions), and Melissa Yeung-Yap (Art as Social Enterprise).
Teotico is managing director of the Galerie Joaquin group of art galleries and publisher of Art+ magazine. Hilario is well-known for his sculptures that have have the distinct images of saints in contemporary forms. Dalisay, who is from Davao City, made his name in Metro Manila as an artists whose works are part bricolage, part sculpture. While Yeung-Yap has worked extensively with indigenous peoples groups in Mindanao as a social entrepreneur in her younger years but has now focused on the Aetas in Tarlac, where her husband is a town mayor.
Providing entertainment breaks to the talks are Mindanao singer-composer Maan Chua and Mindanao’s Foremost Contemporary dance Company the RMMC Teatro Ambahanon Philippines Contemporary Dance Co.
MindanaoArt is a project of Davao-based Lawig-Diwa Inc. through a grant by the National Commission on Culture and the Arts-National Committee on Art Galleries with the support of Gaisano Mall of Davao and the Philippine Women’s College of Davao.
