50 years of PH design at the National Museum
“IF you see a form constantly being reinvented through 50 years, there is a thread to be drawn out. For example, there is an abiding interest in international style, but always with a twist: either a local material is recuperated in the new idiom, or reference is made to indigenous conventions,” said Marian Pastor-Roces, curator of “50 Years of Philippine Design,” a groundbreaking exhibition ongoing at the National Museum of Fine Arts.
In 2023, the Design Center of the Philippines observed its 50 years, which prompted reflection on how “economic forces and cultural shifts, inflection points, deviation from business as usual or normal trajectory shaped the nation’s design story,” said Rhea Matute, executive director of Design Center of the Philippines.
Designed by Ar. Royal Pineda, the exhibit convokes the whole design community, including, among other creatives, Adobo Magazine, AdPhoto, Pioneer Studios and Team Manila. Lent by the manufacturers themselves, specimens are framed within metal scaffoldings, giving visitors the sense of being in the middle of a forward-looking building site.
The design sector is acutely aware of their value as drivers of the economy. Just last year, the Design Center alone developed 719 products for 188 manufacturers. A mapping study has revealed that the design economy has employed 705,000 people and generated P2.9 trillion.
During the past half-century, the Design Center as a government agency “has proven to be deeply involved with its constituency,” Pastor-Roces emphasized.
She said this rise would be impossible without National Artist Arturo Luz, the center’s founding executive director. Although not an industrial designer, Luz brought in modernism and contemporary sensibility, which stimulated creatives to break out of long-held views of the Philippine style. This spirit of modernity is essential to enable Philippine products to infiltrate the global market.
Certain places in the country were also instrumental in ushering in design development. For example, Pastor-Roces observed that in Ermita, from the 1970s onward, anti-establishment intellectuals and aesthetes pioneered social developments through literature, the visual arts, and design.
She added, “Even if Manila’s political class insisted on wearing ternos, the coolest place was Azabache. Amidst Coco Banana of couturier Ernest Santiago and Virginia Moreno’s Indios Bravos, Azabache’s Helena Caratala Guerrero made streetwise fashion hip.”
Groundbreaking too were the first coffee-table books, produced by the late literary giant Gilda Cordero-Fernando with her friends.
Comics and tattoos
The Luz Legacy in Philippine design stands front and center of the exhibit, as it looks to his Buri Chair as a hero piece. Not wholly comfortable that the “Ms. Universe Chair” was the exemplar of the buri chair, Luz designed a minimalist alternative.
For this exhibit, the producers asked contemporary designers to reimagine Luz’s original design and mash it using sustainable materials or those being manufactured by local communities.
The Design Center has spearheaded research, especially on organic materials and agricultural waste, to innovate processes that would provide additional revenues for farming and local communities. These initiatives also offer a livelihood for the marginalized artisanal and agricultural sectors. One result is the appearance of products in stoneware, handmade paper and capiz in international markets.
Unexpectedly, the exhibit considers the graphic look of “Pugad Baboy,” a comic strip that became popular in the late ‘80s, as a major milestone. Pastor-Roces recalled, “Earlier, there was “Tisoy” and his rat “Ikabod Bubwit” by one of the most effective and hilarious social critics of his time, Nonoy Marcelo.”
By that time, designers of the fledgling democracy liberated from a 20-year dictatorship were telling stories of everyday Filipinos. Such irreverent celebration of being Filipino might also be seen recently in “Garapata” by Dexter Fernandez.
The exhibit’s penultimate statement pieces are two photographs of tattooed individuals. The first is of a couple, with the wife a political science professor and the husband a banker. The second piece is of members of the Kadangyan rock band. Today, the indigenous patterns that in the ‘70s were formerly found on craft objects are now on bodies, evincing that design has become comfortable in its own skin.
In February, Arts Month, 50 more objects will be added to the exhibit, which will explore the relationship between design and contemporary art. “ART X DESIGN” will then be launched on February 23 and will run until April 21, 2024.
The exhibit “50 Years of Philippine Design” is ongoing at the National Museum of Fine Arts, Padre Burgos Drive, Rizal Park, Manila. For more info, contact Stephanie.padilla@ designcenter.gov.ph.
(Part 2 of this article will be published on Feb. 6, 2024.)