I know you will be given a lot of talk about investment opportunities but I’d like to talk about some smaller investments that you might be interested in – paintings of Filipino artists. I can guarantee you these investments will give you less risk, more enjoyment and the investment amount is very small.

As you may have noticed, we have a great diversity when it comes to art as we have many different groups with many different influences. I am proud to say that we are rich when it comes to art. We probably have as many visual artists as we have islands in the Philippines.

Artists In Demand
For investors who mainly look at art for high return, you would have noted that auctions in the two leading auction houses, Sotheby’s and Christie’s, featured our well-known artists like Anita Magsaysay Ho, Kiukok, Vicente Manansala, Juan Luna, Botong Francisco, and Fernando Amorsolo among others.

Some of their works are so scarce that they are sought after in the auction houses. Many collectors are looking for early works of these artists and that is when the bidding goes very high. Two years ago, Anita Magsaysay Ho fetched the highest price for her painting of over $600,000.

Unfortunately, though, the auction houses’ main emphases are works of very old Filipino artists or those who have already passed away. There is not enough focus on contemporary artists.

But this ignorance of contemporary Filipino artists is beginning to change for a number of reasons. Many of the Filipino artists living in international capitals like New York, San Francisco, London, Paris, Berlin have began to make their mark on the local art scene. In the mid-80s I was living in Paris and came across Nena Saguil. I spent many days talking to her in her small cubicle in Paris filled with paintings which at that time very few Filipinos knew about. And yet she was collected by museums in Europe. In a recent auction, her small painting sold for over $67,000.

Another example is Alfonso Osorrio who lived in New York. Ossorio painted during the period of Jackson Pollock, deKooning and Rauschenberg. I remember going to his place in the Hamptons and it was like a huge Ossorio museum. Although his paintings hung next to his friend Jackson Pollock at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, he never had a major exhibition in the Philippines, even though his greatest wish was to have a major show in the Philippines. His works are also collected by almost all major art museums in America. He did a wonderful mural in one of the churches in Negros Occidental.

In recent years, a number of younger Filipino artists have followed the path to Western countries including the enfant terrible Manuel Ocampo – who was a favorite of curators and art dealers in the 1990s and is currently living in California, David Medalla in London, Gaston Damag and Ofelia Gelvezon Tegui in Paris and Lina Liani in Italy. Paul Pfeiffer, who lives in New York, has participated in the Venice and Whitney Bienale and has been awarded the Bucksbaum Award in New York. Lani Maestro who is based in Canada, a multi-media artist, won the Grand Prize in the Havana Bienale in Cuba.

Different Strokes
Filipino artists come from different schools. There are the early avant garde painters in the likes of Hernando Ocampo, Arturo Luz, Nena Saguil, Cesar Legaspi, and Mauro Malang Santos who belonged to the generation of the 1940s.

There are the modernists – Lee Aguinaldo, Romulo Olazo, Roberto Chabet, Ray Albano, Gus Albor, Impy Pilapil, and Lao Lianben who venture into the total abstract and non-objective art.

The 1970s were marked by political unrest and a growing anti-establishment sentiment, hence the beginning of Figurative Expressionism with artists like Ben Cabrera with his larawan series, Manuel Baldemor with his interpretation of his hometown landscape, Danilo Dalena’s Alibangbang series, Onib Olmedo’s street vendors, prostitutes and other denizens in his own stylistic way.

In the 1980s, the social realist painters like Edgar Fernandez, Renato Habulan – who hails from Tondo and whose series on Sisa, crazed mother of Rizal’s Noli Me Tangere – exposed his works to the art world. Jose Tence Ruiz was also known for his series on the “Alienation Suite.’’ Another award-winning social realist was Antipas Delotavo. Elmer Borlongon was a member of the Sanggawa, a collaborative group who did murals depicting the life on the streets, particularly the lives of the children. The painting called “Water of Life” was one of my refugee paintings from the series called “Portraits of Cambodia.”

The Philippines is also famous for religious art, which is not surprising given our Catholic background like Norman Dreo’s Ipinako sa Krus. An ex-seminarian, Norberto Roldan examines aspects of Filipino spirituality through his icons and religious paraphernalia related to his Catholic practices. Alfredo Esquillo, Jr. explores the contradictions in reference to the Catholic faith.

There are artists who deal with feminine issues and issues of identity like Agnes Arellano, Yasmin Sison, Francesca Enriquez and Norma Belleza with her portrayal of the everyday life.

Then there are the conceptual, post-modern, and installation artists like Gerardo Tan, Sid Hildawa and Ces Avancena. They were all part of the recent exhibit in Singapore called extra small-EXTRA LARGE where they were able to challenge the idea of setting up an exhibition internationally at low costs and in a short period of time.

Exhibiting Filipino creativity
There has been an increase in the number of Filipino artists participating in the Southeast Asian reqional festivals, competitions, and art fairs. In 1992, the Sydney Bienale had the work of Imelda-Cajipe Endaya featured as one of the major contributors to Southeast Asian art.

The First Queensland Art Gallery Asia Pacific Triennial held in 1993 had the largest contingent of Filipino artists to participate: Santiago Bose, Imelda Cajipe-Endaya, Francesca Enriquez, Lazaro Soriano, Roberto Villanueva, Junyee, Alvarado, Brenda Fajardo and Julie Lluch-Dalena.

In 1995, Indonesia hosted the first “Contemporary Art of the Non-Aligned Countries” where several curators from the region were invited to select artists to participate. Fernando Modesto and I were chosen from the Philippines.

The ASEAN Art Awards was created to support the development of ASEAN contemporary art and to increase the national and international exposure for ASEAN art and artists. The Philip Morris Group of Companies is the first organization to have provided a platform for the young artists of the region. Our very own Nona Garcia won the grand prize last year with her work that demonstrated a strong element of experimental art, combining painting and x-ray.

The Nokia Arts Awards Asia Pacific started in the year 2000, where Filipino artist Rodel Garcia won the first price of US$8,000, educational grant and training programs in New York and Finland.

The recent Singapore art fair held in 2002, witnessed several Philippine galleries participating like Galeria Duemila, Finale, the Drawing Room, and non-Filipino galleries carrying works of several Filipino artists. The Filipino artists in the fair did very well. I just came back from the Philippines and learned that more galleries will participate in 2003.

Developing Art Enthusiasm
Gallery owners and dealers have played a very active and aggressive role in promoting their artists. In San Francisco, there is an art dealer who deals with Philippine masterpieces and is very active in the auction houses. In the California area, there are a number of galleries representing Filipino artists living in the Bay area.

During the past two years while residing in Singapore, I have seen several galleries showcasing Philippine artists, among them the Ippreciation Gallery, the Sculpture Square, Art Seasons Gallery, Atelier Frank, Sunjin Gallery, and Plum Blossoms Gallery.

There have also been an increasing number of artworks in public places in Singapore in the last five years. The galleries and dealers are mainly responsible for putting these artworks in public space as well as in hotels and office buildings. Ramon Orlina’s glass sculpture at the Singapore Art Museum and my mural at Singapore Expo are examples that have increased the public’s awareness of art. I will have a ceiling installation called ”Sky is the limit’’ at the atrium of the newly opened Esplanade.

The art museums in most of Southeast Asian countries have played a major role in promoting local artists. The Singapore Art Museum has been a pacesetter in buying art works from the Philippines. “Marcos and his cronies” was bought by Singapore in 2000. The Fukuoka Museum has continuously invited Filipino artists to participate in their Bienale, and at the same time purchasing works of participants. Roberto Feleo had a one-man-exhibit where his works seem to reflect the Filipino history of bitter struggle for the sovereignty from Spain, Japan and the United States.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art has played a very important role in co-sponsoring Philippine exhibits like the traveling show called ‘’At Home and Abroad: 21 Contemporary Filipino Artists’’ which was exhibited at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco and the Contemporary Arts Museum in Houston. As a result, these museums have become important venues for our artists.

Other government support groups like the National Council on the Arts, foundations and art centers play important tasks of giving financial support to the artists. These efforts, however, still fall short compared to what is being done in the West. I would like to see a similar National Endowment for the Arts, Gugggenheim fellowships and other art patronages. It would be nice in the Philippines if we could even have, perhaps, Lopez, Ayala or Gokongwei fellowships.

Collecting Philippine Art
The profile of collectors of Philippine art has changed significantly. In the past, much of Philippine art was bought by expatriates looking for a low-cost cultural reminder of their stay in the country. They tended to prefer barebreasted women and traditional rural scenes. Nude women always sell, whether it is in Mabini or Sotheby’s. More importantly, Philippine art was supported by a small number of local patrons who tended to be nationalistic.

In recent years the collector profile has changed tremendously with increasing wealth of upper middle class Filipino professionals’ greater appreciation of art in general and promotion of their respective artists. Many Filipinos living overseas are actively purchasing works of Filipino artists. This is happening in New York, Washington, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Jakarta and Singapore. These collectors will grow in the future and a good example is the number of Filipinos who showed up at the recent opening of the Singapore Art Fair.

A good example of this is Jun Villalon, owner of the Drawing Room who after the opening night was very pleased with the sales, thanks to the support of the Singapore Philippine community.

The Local Touch
Some Filipino artists are not only turning to their cultural roots for inspiration but are also increasingly using local and indigenous materials like leaves, shells, twigs, homespun, bark, and animal hair for their artwork. There were many reasons to resort to this medium. The escalating cost of imported art materials was an issue.

During the Marcos era, there was a growing nationalistic sentiment which gave a lot of artists a new reason to find a new medium. Installation art was one way of rejecting the traditional form of art. With installation came the materials which artists use: leaves, twigs, barks, shells, and fabric, among others. Artists like Santiago Bose, Junyee, Paz Abad Santos, Roberto Villanueva and Jerusalino Araos were known for their works for their use of indigenous materials. They have continued to pursue their art this way putting the Philippines in the map through representations in foreign exhibitions.

Artists’ Woes
A major problem in the Philippines is that funding and training for the protection of Philippine art in both the physical and intellectual sense is not available. In the physical sense, many of our museums, unlike the Western museums, do not have the capability to take care of insurance, documentation, preservation and conservation of valuable pieces. I have been in the backrooms of many museums in the Philippines where paintings carefully done by noted artists are piled up on top of each other, paperworks are getting mildewed, and there’s flooding in the storage rooms.

Another growing problem is that much of Philippine art is being copied or modified by unscrupulous forgers. A typical example of this is when on two separate occasions, two 5-star hotels in Indonesia stole my artwork, copied them 300 times so that each room would have a copy, not even bothering to ask my permission. To add insult to injury, I found out that the forger is a Philippine art consultant who lives in Los Angeles.

Unfortunately for some of our well-known artists, there is a danger of complacency as once they become well-known for a certain style, their dealers ask them to produce similar work over and over again. Many are seduced by the sales which in the end stifles their creativity and will never grow from that complacency.

Moving On
But Philippine art, indeed, has made its mark in the western world, specifically in Australia, Europe, and the USA.

To the Western world, any art that is not from North America or Europe must be folk art and there is a lack of appreciation. I remember when a New York curator came to my studio and we started discussing Asian contemporary art and how she should start making exhibitions from them. She did not know what I was talking about. She wanted to know if these artists were doing folk art. I managed to tell her that it is very important for her to look for these artists. Otherwise she will be losing her job in the future.

I hope I was able to give you a good tour of the Philippine art scene and I can only encourage all of you investors out there to buy art and support the Filipino artists of your choice.

I want to tell you a story about an international investor I met on the plane from Zurich to Singapore. I asked him what he did and he said he was an international investor coming to Asia to try to restructure some of his failing projects. He said: “I should have invested more in my art collection. Even in bad times they give me joy and they very rarely go down in value.” I hope you all keep this in mind when you make your next investment.