Sometimes we wonder how a single white dot on a black paper can fascinate an artist’s view. Sometimes the things which we thought are of no use can be magically transformed by an artist’s hands. Sometimes we look at artworks simply, compared to how an artist’s imagination functions upon seeing the same thing.
Leonardo da Vinci once said, “The artist sees what others only catch a glimpse of.” Perhaps, everybody appreciates the work of an artist but not everyone has the gift to see what’s beyond that art.
Part of the Albert Faurot Lecture and Workshop Series for Culture and the Arts, a lecture entitled “The Noodle Machine and Other Collaborations” was held last Aug. 15 at the Audio Visual Theater-1. Fine Arts teachers of Silliman University, Lyra Garcellano and W. Don Flores, were the guest speakers of the lecture which focused on collaboration and the importance of the space in between. “He needed to exist. I needed to exist,” said Garcellano.
The Manila-based artist Lyra Garcellano, whose works often revolved on movement, history, and memory, featured her own work entitled “A Filipino Girl,” which mimics the popular colonial postcards during the 1900s—only that it exposes a challenge to racial stereotyping. W. Don Flores also featured his own work, “Syllabary,” which looks like a mixed culture of calligraphy since the painting depicts strokes.
These two people of different working styles collaborated because of their similarity when it comes to aesthetics and design preferences. The lecture emphasized how collaboration in the working relationship of artists is like an inverted triangle. Two different artists collaborate to form a single artwork. But it wasn’t the output that was given much attention rather, the space inside the triangle which is what actually defines the whole piece. After the lecture, there was an open forum to cater to the audience’s questions.
Art is something people create not just for income, though it is deemed necessary at times because one cannot survive without a single penny. “If you’re making art, you kind of have to decide [if] you are going to make money out of [it] or [ask if] am I my own client,” responded Flores in an open forum.
Art, after all, is an expression of the inner soul applied to the real world.
