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Tuesday, June 07, 2005
Banglos Sculptures: When discarded wood is the prescription
By giving driftwood a third life, these sculptors get a chance at a better one. Michelle P. So whittles away.
FOR most people in General Nakar, Quezon province, the driftwood and fallen logs remind them of the killer typhoon last December. But for the Pujalte family and the others in Barangay Banglos, they provide a medium for their newfound talent and an opportunity to earn money.
From those driftwood, 12-year-old Mezie Pujalte has sculpted a bowl, a dragonfly, and fish of various sizes and kinds.
“The driftwood provided the form and I pictured a shape that I could sculpt out of it,” Mezie said in Filipino as she showed her art pieces on display at an improvised exhibit area in Barangay Anoling, General Nakar.
She had sculpted the fish, the one used for the poster of the Banglos Sculptors, in four days and the dragonfly, three. The bowl, which to an untrained eye looks simple and easy to make, was done in three days.
She said she would feel the wood, find its smooth parts, tap its
hardness and imagine the possibilities of the leafless branches.
Mezie, her parents and sister Mary Grace were among the 45 men, women
and children of the coastal barangay of Banglos who learned woodcarving in 10 days under the tutelage of renowned sculptor Rey Paz Contreras.
Contreras took on the mentoring under the auspices of Smart Communications Inc. He has equipped the Banglos folk with a skill that paves the way for art to be made lucrative.
During their “graduation” last May 13, Contreras gave special awards, citing those who are most creative and prolific, those with the most polished work, and even one who was “most patient.” Smart president and chief executive officer Napoleon Nazareno himself handed out the certificates of completion and special awards. The special awardees got chisels and mallets, sculpting tools to aid them in honing their skill.
The Banglos families who have been displaced by the floods are beneficiaries of a housing project undertaken by Smart Communications and Gawad Kalinga as a rehabilitation endeavor in General Nakar.
General Nakar and its neighbors Real and Infanta, towns southeast of Manila and three hours away from the capital, have lost hundreds of its residents and millions in properties to floods that submerged two-storey houses last December.
The art pieces may lack the sophistication of abstract forms, but they capture the pathos of the situation of the Banglos folk. An outsider cannot fathom the pain of loss, fear and helplessness the Banglos folk had gone through during and after the floods. Many of them are still smarting from the damage.
Like their makers, the Banglos sculptures are straightforward. Mazie saw a fish form in the driftwood and so she carved one out of it.
The carvings are far from artless; the art lies in the imagination of the makers who see not just the wood but also the possibilities it offers. And they tell their stories as they chisel the wood into something that is familiar to them. Time is their prescription.
The sculptors, whose ages range from 12 years old to 50, have picked up debris of the floods and have turned discarded wood into art. They’ve realized that the discarded wood offers more than just charcoal, that it can bring them P200 to P5,000 for a carved bowl or fish, not just P65 for a sack of uling.
“From the wood that destroyed their lives and properties, we would like to help them restore their faith and self-worth,” Mon Isberto, Smart public affairs head, said.
Resilience has taken over despair and desolation. And the Banglos folk have shown it in their sculptures.
The Banglos sculptures will be exhibited at the Cultural Center of the Philippines in August and with Contreras’ pieces this month.
(June 7, 2005 issue)
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