In this Issue - The Japan Foundation, Manila
In this Issue - The Japan Foundation, Manila In this Issue - The Japan Foundation, Manila
6 FEATURE BBIEAF: Art as a tool by Joaquin Gasgonia Palencia, MD Executive Director and Founder of BBIEAF for Community Development The large-scale bamboo installations on Bagasbas Beach in Daet, Camarines Norte, Philippines are but ephemeral tangibles of a life-changing event that occurred here from May 30 to June 6, 2010. Under the summer sun, six artists from all over the world, namely, Mia Orsag from Croatia, Stuart Ian Frost of the UK, Tanya Preminger of Israel, Emmanuel Herbulot of France, Irma Lacorte of the Philippines and Chak Chung Ho of HK SAR China immersed with members of six small communities in a collaborative Art-making activity designed to acquire new knowledge, change perspectives, initiate partnerships and create the first steps toward more concrete interventions to alleviate poverty and raise standards of living in the new traditions of environmental sustainability and responsible and empowered citizenhood. The 3rd Bagasbas Beach International Eco Arts Festival (www.bbieaf.org) was initiated in 2003 by the Our Lady of Lourdes College Foundation (www.ollcf.org) in its search for new avenues to address chronic socio-developmental problems that have proven resistant to resolution using traditional methods. The theme for the 2010 BBIEAF was Art+Environment+Sustainability, which meant using Art as Tool for Human and Community Development. Realizing that any intervention would be useless unless it emanates from the stakeholders themselves, the festival focuses on changing perspectives and attitudes of the target populations, and empowering them so that they could both think up of the solutions as well as create the tools to realize them. From its previous stagings in 2003 and 2008, the 3rd BBIEAF has evolved to include more tools in its developmental arsenal. For one, a video art festival was included to further push the aims of the festival by using a medium that has traditionally been close to the Philippine community’s heart – cinema. Using a familiar medium for delivering catalytic learning opportunities makes it an easier task to get across to the target stakeholders. The eminent Japanese video art pioneer, Takahiko Iimura, who graciously accepted curatorial duties for this program, was honored with a mini-retrospective of Photo courtesy of BBIEAF
7 Photos courtesy of BBIEAF his works over 5 decades. He also brought with him some of the best works from a new generation of Japanese video artists from Video Tokyo. The video art program was shown in the public areas in and around the town of Daet – the OLLCF Campus, department stores, malls, public markets, restaurants, as well as the exterior walls of large buildings. This program, aside from the Curator’s Selection and the Iimura Mini-retrospective, consisted of video artists from Germany, USA, France, Iraq, Italy, Canada, Spain and Japan. The Public Art program, curated by Benjamin Edward Hughes II, resulted in two outdoor benches on the OLLCF campus by Jerusalino Araos of the Philippines and Tets Ohnari of Japan. It is the expressed goal of the OLLCF to input Art into the everyday life of its students and faculty members to inculcate its inherent qualities of creativity, innovativeness and superior technical skills. Thus, the 3rd BBIEAF was held with three major programmes – installation, video art and public art – all designed to transfer both contents and methods of superior processual interaction which consisted of new knowledge and transcultural perspectives as well as new mental techniques and points of view. All of these are designed to inject changes in the way some of the most impoverished people in the country view their problems, their situation, and the new tools which they can utilize to make changes that will alleviate their own conditions. In the light of the chronicity of poverty and the culture of helplessness in the country, the BBIEAF seeks to empower the stakeholders by giving them the mental postures needed to rise beyond the despair and frustration and to see that a better future is actually within their grasp with the right knowledge, attitudes and practices. Alongside the BBIEAF, the Center for Empowered and Sustainable Poverty Alleviation (CESPA) of the OLLCF, conducted its first Kabuhayan-Kalikasan workshopseminar designed to give free knowledge and training to interested participants on topics from starting a business, product development, cooperatives, livelihood opportunities and bank micro-lending packages. These ran at the same time as the festival and were supported by the Product Design & Development Center of the Philippines (PDDCP), Technology Resource Center (TRC), Development Academy of the Philippines (DAP), Cooperative Development Authority of the Philippines, ABS-CBN Bayan Foundation, UP Institute for Small Scale Industries, Vitarich, World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Haribon Foundation, Development Bank of the Philippines, Land Bank of the Philippines and others. This project is an acknowledgement of the inseparable interlinking of environmental sustainability with the economic conditions of a community. The BBIEAF and its partners provided both the new agents of change (artists), as well as the tools (art-making and developmental agencies) to empower our needy communities and effect socioeconomic changes through empowered interventions by the stakeholders themselves. At the same time, the world has lessons to learn too – about the kind and persevering spirit of the Filipino and the ways through which a partnership with him can affect so many lives for the better. Finally, the BBIEAF is a pilot project utilizing a novel tool – Art - that is meant to be transferable to any part of the world, and to any people who can use a change of perspective to better their lives through their own empowered interventions. Dr. Joaquin Gasgonia Palencia is the Executive Director and founder of Bagasbas Beach International Eco Art Festival, he has been involved in socio-developmental work through the Our Lady of Lourdes College Foundation of which he is the Executive Vice-President. He graduated with a BS Zoology, cum laude, and an M.D. both from the University of the Philippines and is working on a PhD from the same university. Currently, he is preparing for New Media Daet slated on February 2011.
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- Page 3 and 4: Farewell / Welcome Greetings 3 Dear
- Page 5: HIGHLIGHT 5 Photo courtesy of Toru
- Page 9 and 10: FEATURE 9 Photo courtesy of DLSU Mr
- Page 11 and 12: FEATURE 11 Enjoying the sumptuous m
- Page 13 and 14: I realized that the common challeng
- Page 15 and 16: People • Events • Places 15 Par
6<br />
FEATURE<br />
BBIEAF:<br />
Art as a tool<br />
by Joaquin Gasgonia<br />
Palencia, MD<br />
Executive Director<br />
and Founder of BBIEAF<br />
for Community<br />
Development<br />
<strong>The</strong> large-scale bamboo installations on Bagasbas Beach in Daet, Camarines Norte, Philippines are<br />
but ephemeral tangibles of a life-changing event that occurred here from May 30 to June 6, 2010.<br />
Under the summer sun, six artists from all over the world, namely, Mia Orsag from Croatia, Stuart<br />
Ian Frost of the UK, Tanya Preminger of Israel, Emmanuel Herbulot of France, Irma Lacorte of the<br />
Philippines and Chak Chung Ho of HK SAR China immersed with members of six small communities<br />
in a collaborative Art-making activity designed to acquire new knowledge, change perspectives,<br />
initiate partnerships and create the first steps toward more concrete interventions to alleviate poverty<br />
and raise standards of living in the new traditions of environmental sustainability and responsible<br />
and empowered citizenhood.<br />
<strong>The</strong> 3rd Bagasbas Beach <strong>In</strong>ternational Eco Arts Festival (www.bbieaf.org) was initiated in 2003 by<br />
the Our Lady of Lourdes College <strong>Foundation</strong> (www.ollcf.org) in its search for new avenues to address<br />
chronic socio-developmental problems that have proven resistant to resolution using traditional<br />
methods. <strong>The</strong> theme for the 2010 BBIEAF was Art+Environment+Sustainability, which meant using<br />
Art as Tool for Human and Community Development. Realizing that any intervention would be useless<br />
unless it emanates from the stakeholders themselves, the festival focuses on changing perspectives<br />
and attitudes of the target populations, and empowering them so that they could both think up of<br />
the solutions as well as create the tools to realize them.<br />
From its previous stagings in 2003 and 2008, the 3rd BBIEAF has evolved to include more tools<br />
in its developmental arsenal. For one, a video art festival was included to further push the aims of<br />
the festival by using a medium that has traditionally been close to the Philippine community’s heart<br />
– cinema. Using a familiar medium for delivering catalytic learning opportunities makes it an easier<br />
task to get across to the target stakeholders. <strong>The</strong> eminent <strong>Japan</strong>ese video art pioneer, Takahiko Iimura,<br />
who graciously accepted curatorial duties for <strong>this</strong> program, was honored with a mini-retrospective of<br />
Photo courtesy of BBIEAF
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