An Illustrator's Manifesto

AMIRASOLO AND OTHER ESSAYS

Part 3. In my Book                                     

Essay 28. AN ILLUSTRATOR'S MANIFESTO

(This manifesto was used as wall text for my 2007 solo exhibit of illustrations and paintings at the Crucible Gallery. The remark I made here about a few Picasso imitators as second-rate artists have raised the hackles of some who felt alluded to. Well, allow me to clear things up. I'm not referring to all Picasso imitators, nor to all modernist painters for that matter. The fellows I have in mind were those who haven't gone through the whole route of first learning the rudiments of realist drawing and painting before adopting abstraction or modernist figuration as their style.

But there are exceptions to that "rule", of course. Because, once in a rare while, a genius who never went to art school would burst and break into the art scene, and amaze everyone there with his aesthetically-pleasing and fresh-to-the-eyes modernist artworks.

I wrote this manifesto in a state of pique, when I was reminded again of the snub I was subjected to by a female painter eighteen years before she died. I met her when I was working as a gallery assistant at the Galleria delas Islas in 1986. She came to the gallery one day with photographs of her paintings which she wanted to show to the gallery owners.

She was a vibrant raconteur who had many stories to tell. Our conversation amused me a lot, that's why I promised her that I'll do all I can to get the gallery owners to approve her exhibit proposal. I failed. Mr Robert Lane, co-owner of the gallery, told me that he was amazed by the lady's passion for painting. She was very prolific---she presented pictures of dozens of her paintings. But still, Mr. Lane turned her exhibit proposal down. Her works, which were all Picasso painting look-alikes, were, seemingly, not up to his standards.

The painter was disheartened of course. But only for a while. She just shopped around for another gallery to exhibit in and found it. That gallery was the City Gallery at the Luneta, just walking distance from Intramuros where the Galeria delas Islas is located.

I remember that Lalyn Buncab, the manager of Galeria delas Islas, received an invitation to attend the show opening, but she didn't want to attend. That's why it was only me and painter friend Edgar Saballo who went to the cocktail reception. It was apparently a success judging from the big number of guests present. I don't know how many paintings she eventually sold, but I'm sure that she at least sold one because I saw a red dot on the tag of one painting.

I approached her to greet and congratulate her, but to my dismay, she acted as if she didn't see me, and just move on to wherever she intended to go. Dinedma lang ako, hahaha.... Anyway, after partaking of the refreshments laid out on the table, I and Edgar hurriedly left the gallery.)

An Illustrator's Manifesto

I once consulted a fellow painter for advice. I asked him if it is all right for me to mount as my first solo show an exhibition of picture book illustrations. He said no, and I asked him why. "Strategy," he replied: by which he meant, I surmised, that a painter must avoid being labeled an illustrator at the start of his career. Get known as a painter first, then dabble in illustration later.

Implicit in my friend's response is the veiled disdain felt by some painters for illustrators. The matter is made worse by my firsthand observation that some gallery owners themselves are also infected with that conceit. Prior to being okayed by the Crucible Gallery, my exhibit proposal for my first solo show of fairy tale illustrations was rejected by four galleries. One gallery owner even dismissed my work with a smirk, which made me feel pathetic indeed. She at least could have softened the blow by explaining that my work will look incongruous in a gallery with a penchant for showing angst-ridden paintings.

But no matter, I know that in time, I can somehow prove my point that there are only second-rate artists, not second-rate art forms.

Before focusing my energies on illustration, I did paintings with proletarian themes Those are grim works, which may perhaps partly explain why they never were commercially successful. Today, in my work as illustrator, what is grim is no longer my artworks' subject matter, but my determination to push my standard to my highest limit. In my more than ten years in picture book illustration, I have never once considered it a breeze  compared to painting. The opposite is true, because the parameters in picture book illustration are many and exacting. There is a manuscript to dissect, an editor to please, and the child readers to entertain. Whereas in painting, you can just affect the nonchalant pose of a recluse and please only yourself.

In our art scene, there appeared from time to time a few Picasso imitators who flaunted nothing but canvases filled with Picassoesque doodles and distortions. But something was glossed over in their posturing. They conveniently forgot that Picasso had mastered the technique of Classical Realism by his fifteenth year. These ersatz Picassos have leapfrogged. Although not yet adept in the two-dimensional construction of the human form, they proceeded forthwith to deconstruct it. And presto, they then wore with pride the label 'modernist'.

Lest I be accused of inviting controversy, I do not of course insinuate that all modernists are poseurs. Far from it. I sincerely admire the works of Arturo Luz, Malang, Prudencio Lamarrosa, Marcel Antonio, and many other modernists. And I intend to one day align myself with them and be a modernist painter too. But no leapfrogging for me. I reserve my disdain only for those who mask their ineptness in the realist technique with the camouflage of modernism. They are the second-rate artist I am alluding to.

I repeat, there is no second-rate art form. Each art form, be it painting, book illustration, animation, digital graphics, etc., is as good as any. What counts is the practitioner's level of competence. And competence I think is what I've shown in my suite of Hans Christian Andersen and Brothers Grimm fairy tale illustrations---discipline also, and patience. And courage too---the courage to stare back at the poverty that stared me in the face. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining. For among the publishers that I have worked for, my present publisher Reni Roxas of Tahanan Books is the most generous. She never hesitated to offer me fees way beyond the going rate of other publishers.

But with the actual art making process stretched into more than a year, the whole enterprise seemed to cease being lucrative. But believe me, money is never a factor in my success equation. What I've set out to do when I embarked on this project was to create works that will compare not too unfavorably with the world's best. I may have fallen short of my goal, but who cares. I have done what I can and completed my best work yet. I have wielded with much agony the tool that I'm most familiar with---my adeptness in a certain realist technique that another fellow painter said borders on the obsessive. And that proves another point: that we illustrators are also capable of suffering in the pursuit of excellence in our art. And that we too have our own angst, like any starving painter.