KALYE ILONGGO: A Photographic Journey

Museo Iloilo, Fujifilm Philippines, and the UPV Chancellor's Committee on Culture & the Arts invite everyone to KALYE ILONGGO: A Photographic Journey, the first photographic exhibit of Street & Documentary Photographers - Iloilo (SDPI). The exhibit will feature 60 prints in color and black & white, aiming to raise the Ilonggo consciousness about themes that do not readily fit the usual concept of beautiful.

Consistent with conventions on street photography, Kalye Ilonggo is confrontational and compels the viewers to look at what may often be disregarded or not minded despite being present in everyday encounters. Inspired by street photographers like Alex Webb, Henri Cartier Bresson, Luis Liwanag, and Rick Rocamora, the photographs in the collection celebrate not beauty itself but le moment décisif, the small gesture, the elusive shaft of light, the geometry, the fortuitous gathering of elements that create meaning to the scene. In effect, the collection invites the viewer to become firstly a mindful observer then become a participant in the creation of beauty.

The photographers in Kalye Ilonggo are Rey Bayona, Greg Delos Reyes, Lucille Detoyato, Leofil Durana, Alan Fajardo, Jay Gadong, Dennis Gamarcha, Israel Gonzalez, Meryl Puljanan Hiso, Jon Japitana, Izanor Lyn Javier, Vernan Jagunap, Jonathan Jurilla, Emmanuel Lerona, Christian Lozañes, Alfredo Nathaniel Marte, Ira Pahila, Ruperto Quitag, Nelson Rondan, JP Sarsoza, and Joy Sumagaysay.

The exhibition will also feature ISTORYA KURIS-KURIS, a series of artist interaction and lectures with the following topics and schedules: July 4 (1:00 pm) - SP Workshop with Rommel Bundalian; July 5 (6:00 am) - Photowalk with Rommel Bundalian; July 6 (1:00 pm) - "Kalyegraphy: SP 101 with Jonathan Jurilla"; (2:00 pm) - "SP: From Bresson to Bacani" with Nelson Rondan; July 7 (1:00 pm) - "SP Survival Guide: Conquer Your Fear" with JP Sarsoza; (2:00 pm) - "Dealing with People in the Streets" with Emmanuel Lerona; July 8 (1:00 pm) - "SP Approaches & Techniques" with Israel Gonzalez; (2:00 pm) - Art & Photography with Alfredo Nathaniel Marte.

Kalye Ilonggo is curated by Ilonggo artist PG Zoluaga. It will open on July 3, 2015, and will be on view from July 4 to 16, 2015, at the Museo Iloilo. Museo Iloilo is located at Bonifacio Drive, Iloilo City. For more information, please contact Mr. James Mozart Amsua, curator of Museo Iloilo, at (33) 3372986 or email at jamesamsua@yahoo.com.

BINÁLAY: A Photography Exhibit by Jurilla, Lerona, & Quitag

The UPV Chancellor's Committee for Culture & Arts presents Binálay, an exhibit of the photographs of Jonathan P. Jurilla, Emmanuel A. Lerona, and Ruperto P. Quitag, at the UPV Art Gallery.

Binálay -- taken from a Hiligaynon word that means made, constructed, or invented -- presents forty-five photographs from the trio. The photos, taken mostly in the urban streets, document prosaic yet sometimes surprising realities of the street dweller in the context of development. Drawing inspiration from street photographers like Alex Webb, Bruce Gilden, and Gary Winogrand, the trio present the street dweller in different states -- working, toiling, resting, sitting, playing, or sleeping -- making the street documentary a broad one sans pretense of being comprehensive.

A variety of shots ranging from almost-portraits taken at close range to distant silhouettes of workers in panoramic scenes, as well as shadow plays on the walls and on the ground, give rise to a dialogue, or dialogues, not only between the different photos of just one of the photographers but of all the three photographers in the exhibit. The collection  in turn invites and challenges the viewer to examine his or her own construct of the reality of the street, and to join in the photographers' dialogue about development. 

Jurilla hails from Talisay City, Negros Occidental; Lerona is from Alimodian, Iloilo; while Quitag is from San Enrique, Iloilo. Jurilla and Lerona are faculty members of UP Visayas, Miagao, Iloilo, while Ruperto Quitag works as a staff also in UP Visayas. This is their first trio exhibit.

Director and UPV professor Kevin Piamonte is the curator for Binaláy which will open on September 10, 2014 and run until September 26, 2014. The UPV Art Gallery is at the Main Building of the UP Visayas Iloilo City Campus. For more information, please contact Friya at (33)3379159 or email at upv_cca@yahoo.com.

Project Batchoy (dot) 35 - Haiku Exhibit

A Poetry exhibit of English Haikus by Luis Batchoy interpreted by Iloilo's most talented Photo Artists and Shutter Chroniclers featuring the photos of Elvert Dela Cruz Bañares, Eric Barbosa Jr., Erna Foerster, Emmanuel Lerona, Rizandro Napone, Steve Francis Quiatchon, & Jp Sarsoza, and 90-seconder short films by the Senior Mass Communication Students of the University of St. La Salle- Bacolod. The exhibit is curated by Daniella Julieta Caro.

Exhibit opens on March 16, 2014, 2:30 pm, at the Cinematheque Iloilo Gallery, Solis Street, Iloilo City, and will until March 30, 2014. 

ENCOUNTERS: A Photography Exhibit by Emmanuel A. Lerona

PRESS RELEASE

The UP Visayas Chancellor’s Committee for Culture and the Arts presents ENCOUNTERS, an exhibit of photographs by Emmanuel Lerona at the UPV Art Gallery. Encounters presents 40 portraits of rural folk that Lerona accidentally met in domestic travels spurred by his desire to document vanishing scenes and practices of his childhood especially those peculiar to his native Panay Island.

Tight shots that hint at the emotional, mental or psychical states of the subjects as well as wide shots that contextualize them make up the collection that signals Lerona’s debut as a photo artist.

Lerona’s photographs draw documentary inspiration from the famed father of Philippine photography, Eduardo Masferre but with a Lacanian spike as Lerona privileges his subjects’ visual potential highlighting their gaze, a characteristic of most images taken by, among other photographers, Walker Evans during the Great Depression like in his iconic Annie Mae Gudger (Sharecropper’s Wife). The collection, at once, reveals how much Lerona has achieved his prime documentary objective to recoup and frame for posterity his childhood memories and how he has been pleasantly jolted by his discovery of his, as well as his subjects’, humanity and humanness in their photographic eyeballs.

Lerona, an Instructor at the Division of Humanities, UP Visayas Miag-ao, seriously took up photography in 2009 and had trained with international photographer Manny Librodo who is also an Ilonggo and a UPV alumnus. Artist and UPV professor Martin Genodepa curates Encounters which will be on view from August 27 through September 16, 2013. UPV Art Gallery is at the UP Visayas Iloilo City campus. For information, contact (033) 3379159.

Bauko, Bontoc, Sagada: A timelapse video

Here is a rather short video I made of our trip to Bauko, Bontoc, & Sagada from way back in 2012. 

This just makes me want to go back to the Cordilleras once more.