GALVEZ, Diosdado IV R.

BSA 1-2

Art Appreciation (Midterm)

1. Discuss how art became a tool during colonization. (Filipino art development)

From the arts of the pre-colonization period all the way up to today’s modern and
contemporary arts, the Philippines is a country that has been greatly influenced by the
cultures of other countries, mainly through trade and/or colonization, and this is ever
present and reflected in their arts.

Pre-colonial art in the Philippines displayed ideas of mythical creatures and

various tribal idealogies. From art we can also see what people from the past believed
in: for example, we can deduce that our ancestors believed in the afterlife as can be
seen in the art of the manunggul jar wherein there is a boat with people rowing – which
symbolizes the journey to the afterlife, as it was a jar for the dead. Another example is
sarimanok, a mythical creature of the Maranao Tribe – it is a legendary bird that
possesses colorful wings; and up until now the clothes and garments of the Maranao
tribe are still attributed to and influenced by the legendary bird. Islamic art is another
type of pre-colonial art that conquered the southern part of the archipelago, particularly
Mindanao. The major attribute of this art is the geometric patterns which reflected the
Islamic believers’ perspective. Up until present time, we can see the mosques, the
clothing and the customs of our fellow Muslim brothers and sisters as clear
representations of the influence of this art. These and many more indicate that the
culture from the pre-colonization period is clearly reflected through its art; and as can
later be seen the influences on these arts also reflect the influences on the society –
colonization.

When the Spaniards came, they saw that the Filipinos were pagans and realized
that the quickest way to conquer the Philippines was through the spread of Christianity.
Works of art then became a tool in the spread of Christianity of the Spaniards by
introducing ideas that revolved around and about religion and artistry, the Filipinos of
the time were unaware that they were being colonized. Slowly but surely, the Spanish
were able to manipulate the minds of the Filipinos, changing the norms and beliefs of
the tribes and spreading Christianity throughout the region. Art and religion became
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non-lethal yet powerfuls weapon held by the Spaniards, as they branded any who
opposed them as devils and such – which caused society to shun these people and
thus eliminating all opposition at the time. The influence of Spanish art can still be seen
up to this date, particularly in the architecture of ancient Spanish churches and the
iconic Intramuros. Besides architecture, there are also other art forms that came into
light such as writing, painting and many more.

As soon as the Spanish have departed, the Americans began conquering the
country and brought another idea, incorporating it with art – with a goal of establishing a
new regime and getting rid of the influence of the previous colonizers. During the
American era, arts mainly focused on the idea of commercial and advertising arts. Fine
Arts was integrated into the curriculum as this gives value and builds on the ideas that
the Americans have brought. The Americans also favored idyllic sceneries and secular
forms of arts as it portrays calmness as if to bury the memories of the wars that
happened before. This is because the Americans wanted us to think that they were our
allies instead of colonizers so they wanted to eliminate all ideas which could cause or
lead to violence. Arts from the American era are still present today, particularly in
famous sculptures like Oblation in UP, Bonifacio Monument in Caloocan, and
MacArthur’s Landing in Leyte. Many art forms were also greatly influenced such as
paintings, one example is Fernando Amorsolo and his work Planting Rice.

Since the Japanese did not reside in the Philippines for too long, their influence in
Philippine art is not as strong as the previous colonizers, but despite this, the Japanese
still imposed a pretty considerable impact on our art. The Japanese did not really
spread their art but rather gave preference to the indigenous arts and traditions of the
country – this is because of their propaganda which is Asia belonging to Asians. During
the Japanese era, more and more people began to appreciate our own cultures and
tradition.

Due to the various foreign influences, the Filipinos have adapted a colonial
mentality wherein they have a preference for anything foreign, particularly Western. But
there are artists who are trying to combat this by embracing Philippine art and
representing our own Philippine culture and tradition through it. Now in the modern era,
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the Philippines was already an independent country and nationalism was high therefore
majority of the themes present in the art of the time was national identity and the
concept of bayanihan. The modern arts then gave way to the contemporary arts that
was influenced also by historical context. It became an offshoot of society and art
started to become an expression of the people.

Art has always been a reflection of the culture and philosophies of a society. As
can be seen from the development of Filipino art, it can be even used as a tool to
change a society’s culture and alter it to one’s favor as such was the case of the
colonizers of the past.

2. Aesthetic Values

As a branch of philosophy, aesthetics tackles beauty and arts. To be specific, it

answers the questions “Why are beautiful things beautiful?” and “What makes
something a work of art?” Aesthetics is defined as the creation and appreciation of
beautiful human-made objects. There are two ways in which beauty can be considered:
the relative view describes beauty as being upon the eye of the beholder, while the
absolute view describes beauty as being within the thing itself. In the relative view,
beauty become subjective as the way each individual sees something is different
therefore what is beautiful to one can be the opposite to another. Meanwhile for the
absolute view, beauty is embedded within the object itself and it is beautiful regardless
of the beholder; its beauty is objective and unarguable.

Aesthetics can be divided into 3 theories: theory of beauty, theory of art and
theory of art criticism. The first theory talks about the nature of beautiful things which
can be related to the argument on whether beauty is subjective or objective – this can
also be directed to the two ways of considering beauty. Next is the theory of art which
talks about the essence of art, the process and emotions that are input in the production
of an artwork is its essence and a repetitively created “artwork” can be argued as having
lost its essence for it is already a mechanical task. Last is the theory of art criticism
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BSA 1-2

which talks about evaluating the merit or demerits of an artwork, it approaches art from
a more theoretical perspective and evaluates an artworks significance.

Is it true or false? Is it good or bad? Is it beautiful or ugly? These are some of

the categories considered when we talk about aesthetic values. In terms of evaluating
aesthetic values, they all have different levels of evaluation and these are dependent on
according to what sense it is being evaluated; it is like a standard or like a definition of
what truly aesthetic thing is. The aesthetic values vary in different forms of art. The first
sense being the sense of sight which mainly regards visual art as its form – the eye
evaluates the art based on its color (picturesque or blur), shape (pretty or grotesque),
size (cute or piquant) and motion (graceful or awkward). Examples of visual arts are
painting, sculpture, architecture, dance and drama. The next sense is the sense of
hearing, through the ear, it regards sound (lovely or droll) as an art. This form of art is
known as the auditory art, and music and drama are its prime examples. Another sense
is the sense of smell which regards odor (fragrant or foul) through the nose. This art
form is particularly known as olfactory art and an example of it is perfume making.
There is also the sense of taste which makes use of the tongue to evaluate taste
(delicious or pungent). Although culinary art is not limited to the sense of taste (it can be
considered through sense of sight too), it is the best example for it. The sense of touch
(pleasant or harsh) is another sense that evaluates an art through its texture, shape,
size and motion. It evaluates tactile art such as sculpting and lovemaking, although
these can also be associated with visual art which is why shape, size and motion are
also its characteristics. Last but not the least is the sense of imagination which stems
from images (fantastic or harsh) created by the mind. This deals with imaginative art,
particularly literature and drama.

Lastly, there are 14 degrees of aesthetic values, namely: sublime, grand,

elegant, charming, comic, tragic, terrible, scarry, horrible, bizarre, poignant, perverse,
rustic, pathetic. These deal with various combinations on how the beholder of the art
would react such as would it awe, would it delight, would it gloom, etc.
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3. Filipino Aesthetic Worldview

Worldview is defined as the way people look at the universe and the people’s
picture of the universe that lies deep in the heart of culture. The Filipino worldview
therefore would pertain to how Filipinos perceive the universe as reflected by their
culture. This has ten dimensions, namely: natural, biological, communal, social,
normative, ethical, moral, aesthetic, theological, and ideological. But let us focus on the
aesthetic dimension.

The Filipino aesthetic worldview mainly revolves around the term ganda (beauty)
which is the sum total of traits of anything that gives the highest pleasure to the senses.
The concept of beauty in the Filipino worldview is where it should be beautiful inside
and out or panlabas at panloob. The meaning of ganda when applied on a person both
relates to a beautiful physical appearance (pagkataong panlabas) and good social
character/behavior (pagkataong panloob). A combination of both would result in a
beautiful personhood and is what is deemed desirable and valuable in Filipino society.
Also, the term maganda and mabuti could be interchangeable, because as earlier
stated, the culture of Filipino aesthetics involves morality.

Beauty or ganda in the Filipino aesthetic worldview has many categories which
can be appropriated to various situations; it is mainly divided into three which are dilag,
alindog, and rikit. Dilag (gorgeousness) takes more on the panlabas or external beauty
– physical appearance; under it are rangya (appearance, speech or action), inam
(orderliness, neatness or fineness), and dingal (cosmetics, jewelry or attire). Next,
alindog (charm) is more on social character or panloob, it has lambing (affection) and
amo (gentleness) under it. Lastly, rikit (loveliness) is a mixture of both social character
and physical appearance, its subcategories on it which are kinang (radiance) and
ningning (luster); under kinang are kintab and kislap which mean the same, while for
ningning under it is luningning which also means the same as the former.

Ganda also has different kinds of phenomena which are namely: affective, olfactory,
behavioral and ethical, physical and capability. In affective phenomenon, it is more on
emotion and the sentiment evoked from the perceiver of the beauty; it can be described
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BSA 1-2

through words such as nakakaakit or nakakabighani. Meanwhile for olfactory, it is based

on scent and can be described with words like malinis or sariwa. There is also the
behavioral and ethical phenomenon which deals with action or ugali of a person, and
words like mabait or mahinhin are usually associated with it. Next, there is the physical
phenomenon which judges beauty on physical attributes and describing it makes use of
terms such as makinis ang balat or matipuno ang katawan. Lastly, the capability
phenomenon revolves around the ability to perform or do things, terms such as
masipag magtrabaho or magaling magluto are used to describe beauty in this
phenomenon.

4. Does the image below is an Art? Why or why not? (Use or lesson to evaluate).

This picture shows a form of vandalism on public property, particularly on a pillar

inthe highway. In order to evaluate whether something is an art or not, the aesthetic
values present must be considered. A certain work is considered as an art if it follows
the values of aesthetics which are logical, ethical, and aesthetic.
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As we can see, this is an art that expresses an idea and message to all. It is a form
of vandalism which in itself is an art, and the question if it is right or wrong does not
remove the essence of that thus making it an art in general. The only thing that can
prevent us from seeing it as not an art is the Filipino aesthetic worldview, because
through this we can only see something as an art if it is aesthetically and ethically
pleasing. Although this is aesthetically pleasing, it is not ethically pleasing as it is made
on public property which must not be tampered with; this is why some may not consider
this as an art.

In conclusion, this proves that art can really be subjective and its beauty depends on
the eye of the beholder. But for me, it is the meaning of the art and the essence of the
art that makes an artwork an art, because most of the times artworks are meant to send
a message or express an emotion and not to impress everyone only.