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......FFFEATURE:Sanibkulay:'Art From The Heart'By Marz Zafe, |
[Marz is the lead founder of Sanibkulay Visual Arts Group, a new organization of painters and illustrators who are united on the basis of firm belief in and commitment to the Sanibkulay Credo (see next page), which he had worked out with fellow founders Ding Reyes and Ed Bado and titled “Art From the Heart.” In this article ereprinted from the fourth issue of Earthlite Sparks & Reflections, he elaborates on the profound premises of the Credo for the sake of possible recruits into the group, including some who have come in as participants in the ongoing “Sanibkulay sa Kalikasan” paintings exhibit at Earthlite. Marz also handles the painting courses offered by Sanibkulay at this wholisticc place.]THE PHRASE “Art from the Heart” emerged in my mind during the New Moon of September. I was then designing the logo for our newly-formed Sanibkulay Visual Arts Group, and I started by making doodles from the letter “S,” the first letter of our name. At that time, I had no mental picture of what that logo would turn out to be (see below) but the free movements of my pen “chanced” upon theshape of the painter’s pallette. And then I sensed a different feeling. I felt energized. I felt — happily — that my hand was actually guided..
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.....I showed the “S”-palette sketch to members of the group and asked for their comments and suggestions. One suggested that I extend the upper curve in the letter “S” to make thefigure also represent a bird, a known symbol for freedom. Another suggested that I draw the letter “S” as a paintbrush and a curving brushstroke to go with the palette. So I made new sketches putting in their suggestions.
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.....Days later, I was staring at that evolving symbol and something else appeared before my eyes— the entire figure looked like a heart, the anatomical one! Aside from being both palette and bird, it was also a heart, the universal symbol for feeling. A new flash of energy came to me, along with an insight— art works are created with the help of our eyes and hands, but most of all, they come from the heart.
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....This is the part of art that cannot be taught. It just has to be awakened in the heart of each individual......Human life is short, but art can be one aspect of every person’s immortality. But long after the artist shall have gone back to earth as ashes and dust, his or her artworks can remain alive forever in the memory, in the heart and in the spirit, of the Humankind that lives on. S&R
.......This made me appreciate more these words from Credo of the Sanibkulay Visual Arts Group: “Art is the expression of the innermost human feeling and insights, the physical expression of one’s emotional and spiritual breath, throb and pulse.”
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....I felt all the more that every human being has inborn aesthetic capacities, which they express in different, even everyday-life forms, like backyard gardening, cooking in the kitchen, designing in the rooms, for art also means “doing things that have form and beauty.”
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....So, you are an artist because you express your feelings from the heart in a way that has form and beauty. This definition of art may be as old as the figures of animals painted and/or carved on cave walls, such as those found at Lascaux, France, which date from 15,000 to 10,000 B.C.
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....There were also carvings of gods and goddesses, fertility symbols, and other figures which, in the mind of those ancient artists, were relevant to their lives and mass survival. There were also the masks for rituals and spirit dances, an art form that were common among important types of ancient and indigenous visual art expressions.
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.....All of them were artists, they projected what they felt and expressed this in different forms. There were no “intellectual trimmings” in their artworks. There was freedom in expressing one’s beliefs and feelings. Their concentration was on how to harmonize their lives with the streams of Mother Nature.....Then, this flowed across different periods, from the emergence of civilizations in Mesopotamia and Egypt, through the Renaissance, and up to the present-day New Age.
....Art became complicated with the rapid succession of styles that have continued to interplay. Critiques, debates, increased intellectualization, monopoly by the elite, the emergence of the “art industry.” Many artists thought they could only be artists in the real sense if they obeyed the intellectuals, engaged in competition in the market being operated by businessmen reflecting and promoting their interests.
....But, as our Credo says, “Intellectualization of art can never comprehend it fully,” and “too much an-alysis can only diminish free expression and exhilaration.” We of Sanibkulay would “rather create and appreciate than criticize and debate.”
....I feel the urge to do art, and to do much of it. But as poet-actress Chin-Chin Gutierrez put it, as quoted by Sunday Inquirer Magazine:
....“I don’t know what art is... I just do it. When you see something more than what is on the surface, you need to express it. I don’t plan to write a poem -- I just feel a sudden urge to write. It’s like being hungry and wanting to eat. So I write it, finish it, I read it -- and then I realize, this is what this other part of me is saying. It’s a release. It’s enjoyable. When you play the piano, you touch music, and it gives you a lot of inner joy. You feel alive inside.”
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..Sanibkulay Credo
..and Call:.
‘ART
FROM THE HEART
OF ALL’
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We believe that art is the expression
of the innermost human feelings and insights,
the physical expression
of one’s emotional
and spiritual breath, throb and pulse.
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We believe that aesthetics is a basic human faculty, an inborn capacity and an enjoyment
of every human being, and that, therefore,
all humans are artists
in varying paths and degrees of development.
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We believe that art
is the emotional and spiritual resonance
with such beauty and appreciation.
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Intellectualization of art can never
comprehend it fully;
too much analysis can only diminish
free expression and exhiliration.
We would rather create and appreciate
than criticize and debate.
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We believe that all can enjoy together
the synergetic celebration of the combination
of diverse styles and skills,
like the harmony of diverse hues and shades
in the rainbow of Nature
and the palette of Life.
We would rather enjoy this than engage
in comparisons and competition.
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Honest self-expression
and genuine respect for others
are the core values of the Sanibkulay Visual Arts group,
along with the spirit of cooperation and volunteerism.
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We invite to join our group
all who are one with us
on this Credo
and the commitment to propagate it
and to live by it.Sanibkulay Visual Art Group is a grouping of persons actively engaged in visual arts creation who formally and categorically commit to propagate and live by the foregoing Creed which is pluralist, unifying and celebrationist in spirit, and who actually validate such commitment by consistent practice and propagation. Fraternal groups for the other arts are being organized basically under the same principles.
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