XAVIER University-Ateneo de Cagayan, through its Social Development Cluster, is conducting a multimedia art exhibit beginning Wednesday, November 29, until February 2, 2018 featuring the work of several photojournalists and artists on Marawi City before and after the war.
Handuraw Marawi - a Mission Exhibit, is ongoing at the Fr. Francisco R. Demetrio SJ Gallery, Museo de Oro, Xavier University, Cagayan de Oro City, and according to Roel Ravanera, vice president of the Social Development Cluster, the exhibit aims to help create a better understanding of what really happened in the 5-months of fighting between state forces and ISIS-inspired extremists.
"And hopefully this will be a step towards attaining peace, not only in Marawi but also in Mindanao," Ravanera said.
Hobart Savior, director of Xavier Center for Culture and the Arts, said the exhibit will give answers in regards to people's thoughts and sensibilities and will provide several "opportunities to help others and understand the order among the Maranao people who suffered in the Marawi siege."
"We believe that when it happened in May this year, many of our thoughts were divided, our feelings and sensibilities were also divided, with good news, fake news, true news. We thought of perhaps giving you certain answers, perhaps all of the exhibits will give you certain answers that dialogue to your own sensibilities," Savior said.
The exhibit, according to Ravanera, is part of the Mindanao Week of Peace celebration, the Xavier University Festival Days 2017, and Social Development Cluster celebration in January 2018.
Featured in the exhibit are the works of veteran photojournalist Froilan Gallardo, photojournalist Baltazar ‘Bobby’ Lagsa, curator Bing Cariño, Oscar Floirendo, Robert de la Serna, artists Kublai Millian, and Alynnah Macla.
Handuraw Marawi Curator Bing Cariño said the entire collection in the exhibit is divided into eight projects.
Project 1 features Froilan Gallardo's documentation of the "exodus and repatriation" of the locals when the siege ended. This opens and ends the Handuraw gallery tour.
Project 2 shows Hasuna Macla's "Hasna's Pilgrimage" which presents the photographs taken by Marawi residents in the course of the siege. There are also photographs taken by the Social Development Cluster which present their efforts.
Project 3 is "Boxes," a mixed media installation art that exposes the relief, psycho-social interventions, medical mission and sustainable agriculture training of Xavier Ateneo thru its Social Development Cluster.
Project 4 "Handuraw Marawi" shows curated photo montage-essay about the Marawi siege.
Project 5 is an "Art Bomb Series" by Oscar Floirendo, Museo de Oro's Assistant Curator,connects all the component projects of Handuraw as they are all over the museum.
Project 6 showcases "Authentic vs Fake News" which is an interactive social media experiment installation work by Cariño with a select image depicting the destruction of Marawi by Froilan Gallardo
Project 7 features Kublai Millian's "Mindana(once) series" which consists of multimedia paintings using archival photos of Mindanao "once."
Project 8 "Gyera" is a cinematheque where the moving images captured and filmed by Bobby Lagsa will be projected introspecting the experiences of the war and the hopes for a better tomorrow for Marawi and its people.
Handuraw Marawi - a Mission Exhibit, according to Cariño, is a reflective exposition of what has been in Marawi in its glorious past and on what it has become right now due to the siege which, in most cases, brought varied significant questions as regards societal, political, developmental, economic and physical implications.
The exhibit evokes responses that will allow us become more responsible Mindanaoans in particular and as Filipinos in general.