Fragility ( The Ownership)

Hello, People on the Internet!!! October is so good to me, yet I spent my whole week doing nothing. Life being an artist is kinda cool but behind the scenes, there are lots of frustrations, disappointments, and burnouts. There are days where I woke up with the intense motivation to create and the next day It feels like I'm a glue stuck in my bed. >_<.

This time I wanted to share why October is so good to me. I was invited to participate in an Inaugural show of Super Duper Gallery located in Quezon City. This show is super cool because most of the artists that I looked up to are also participating. (blushhhh)

Fragility ( The Ownership)
30x36 inches
Acrylic and Graphite on Canvas
2021

"Fragility" is a series of paintings expressing some unfortunate events where my siblings and I feel so vulnerable during childhood.

"The Ownership" is a statement that Children cannot be owned. They are not owned by their parents, they are not owned by their relatives and they don't belong to anyone but themselves. They are the ones who can decide what they wanted to be and where they wanted to be.

You see, the painting shows a child that doesn't have control of the situation. A humanoid figure behind is firmly wrapping its arm around the child's body. Meanwhile, the child's body is unnoticeable breaking into pieces.

Who can take tomorrow?
Dip it in a dream
Separate the sorrow
And collect up all the cream?
...The candyman can cause he mixes it with love
And makes the world taste good
And the world tastes good cause the candyman thinks it should!
(From Roald Dahl’s Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory)

**“Like Candy”** brings you to a world of pure imagination: we present a world of creations by super-duper artists. Reminiscent of the song helmed by Gene Wilder, the works in the exhibition defy explanation in a space that serves as a platform for freedom and endless possibilities. Candy appears in figures of speech to allude to delight and a little sweetness out of the mundane. That candy gives comfort may be linked to an entire history of how it masks the taste of bitter medicine, bringing comfort to broken bodies and spirits. The first candy-making machine was invented by a pharmacist to crank out medicated candy lozenges. Similarly, truth is a bitter medicine that we readily savor when coated. Art’s aesthetic distance has a comparable effect. The form soothes and ameliorates, so that no matter the subject, the encounter with art enables a surge of sensuous pleasure. Where sugar rush is linked to sensation, candy often figures in celebratory occasions and life events. It is also used for rewards or treats, infused with a vivid color palette that enables the human mind to visualize the benefits. In effect, candy plays an integral role whether as prop for interaction or emotional trigger. In thought it is simile, yet as object it acquires a social life. The taste and smell of candy triggers deep-seated memories of youth and nostalgia, or fleeting moments of joy. We recall faces of loved ones and families -- those from our youth and those whom we have lost.

The phrase “like a kid in a candy store” signifies elation and excitement at having several options or resources. We are confronted with an array of choices and at times, face a conundrum: do we toil away unseen like the oompa loompas or bury our heads in the chocolate river? Or do we patiently wait to inherit a legacy? Candy can also be associated with guilty pleasures, over consumption, anxiety, and indulgence. Like Dahl’s magnum opus, the consumption of candy illustrated through the characters of the diegetic world served to illustrate gluttony, greed, rudeness, and other moral crises.

We are surrounded by gummies, lollipops, chewing gum, chocolate, and all varieties of sweets. Like a box of candy, we never know what we're going to get unless we draw closer. The taste of candy in a box can only be known when one bites into it and savors the taste. “Like Candy” was chosen as the title of the inaugural exhibition of Super Duper Gallery to underscore the prevailing whimsical aesthetic reminiscent of an array of confectionery. It is guaranteed to be a delicious exhibit and Super Duper Gallery invites you to have an enormous bite and experience sensory bliss.

(Exhibition Notes by: Laya Boquiren)