Edwin Wilwayco
October 5 to 24, 2024
Artist Reception
October 5 | 5 PM
Arte Bettina
3rd Level, Greenbelt 5, Ayala Center 1224 Makati, Philippines
“Rhythm and harmony permeate the inner part of the soul more than anything else, affecting it most strongly and bringing it grace.” — Socrates
Even for the man hailed as one of the greatest thinkers of all time—whose namesake logical argumentation laid the groundwork for Western systems of logic and philosophy—music merited ponderance. Of course, despite the artform being in its early form, it was already woven deeply into the cultural fabric of ancient Greece, and Socrates acknowledged its impact on cognitive development and even spiritual being.
Indeed, we listen to music as much as music shapes us. Filipino visual artist Edwin Wilwayco knows this to be true, as the veteran abstractionist allows music to give form to his art. For Wilwayco, his speakers prove as important as his paintbrush, and that we see here in this scintillating art presentation, titled Rhythmic Reverie, inspired by classical music.
Throughout his nearly five-decade art career, Wilwayco has time and again mounted visual tributes to history’s greatest musical composers. He would play their songs, channel the zeitgeist of their era, and submit his painting hand to be moved by the dramatically shifting moods, fantastic harmonic suspension, and other grand ornamentations that characterized the soul-stirring genre. Where the formality and complexity of classical music went—swinging like a frenzied yet calculated pendulum from allentando to ritardando—so did Wilwayco’s curvilinear brushstrokes that convey vigorous movement, spatial depth, and utter submission to greater forces. The result: A compelling oeuvre built on the abstract visualization of musical movement, covering the manifold concerti of mononymous maestros such as Vivaldi, Schubert, Beethoven,
Chopin, Dvorak, and Bach.
While the artist’s fascination with the musical category may suggest a deep-rooted devotion, a case of love-at-first-listen, or some other form of romantic origin story, the opposite is true. As difficult as it is to believe, there was a time when Wilwayco despised classical music.
There was no reason other than the artist, when he was young, had yet to develop a fondness for the genre. It was simply a taste that he had yet to acquire.
What the artist favored in his earlier years was the music of his generation. Rock & Roll was in, and Elvis Presley conferred its king. Wilwayco, among the Cultural Center of the Philippines’ 13 Artists awardee in 1994, credits his love for music to his father. Their Guimba, Nueva Ecija household listened for hours on end vinyl records of singers like Harry Belafonte and Matt Monro. It wasn’t until The Beatles came that father and son hit a musical common ground.
Then, everything changed in the 1980s when Wilwayco was in England as a British Council Scholar for painting at the West Surrey College of Art and Design, Farnham. A good friend, the late Prof. Eric Torres, Ateneo Art Gallery’s first curator, asked him to buy in London a long list of vinyl records, primarily of classical composers. A curious Wilwayco inspected his purchase, grew tempted to give it a listen, and, on one weekend, he caved in. The artist played Mozart’s early symphonies, then the late, followed by Beethoven and Vivaldi.
When Wilwayco dropped the needle on the records, he was immediately blown away. The artist saw in his mind’s eye a captivating, kaleidoscopic showcase of cosmic lightshow, replete with whirling nebulae and other celestial elements, dancing, as if calling to him. It was an out-of-body experience, and he never stopped listening to classical music since.
In this show, Rhythmic Reverie, Wilwayco once again shares what he sees and feels from what he hears. However, unlike in past exhibitions, the artist in this presentation pays tribute to no classical composer in particular. Instead, it serves as his homage to the entire genre of classical music.
The visualizations have evolved, becoming more sophisticated with the years as Wilwayco has become more and more perspicacious in listening. With all the countless hours he has spent with master composers, the artist has a much better understanding of the universe that classical music presented him with on that fateful day in England. A word that sums up of all the featured artworks in this show is “deliberate.” Whereas in his previous music-inspired exhibits Wilwayco has attempted to interpret the whole of a song, the artist, in this showcase, has chosen to pick his spots. There persists a palpable sense of control, where he is more intentional in which segment or instrument in a song to focus on. Thus, the artworks feel relatively minimalist to Wilwayco’s previous works, but somehow engage and narrate just the same, if not more.
All around there are noticeable “negative spaces” (a very loose usage of the term, given these margins still carry Wilwayco’s masterful gradients, just not his swirls and lines and other abstract forms). These clearances allow all the other elements to come forward, particularly dark and heavy lines that appear like outlines, apart from the fact that the artist rendered them in more pronounced strokes.
Such is seen in No. 5, where the lines act like borders that guide the eyes as it spots rewarding splotches of color pops and other textured details. Meanwhile, No. 15 carries more elements and meanings awaiting discovery. In its see of yellow await streaks of pink and other vibrant colors that would surely delight any wandering gaze. There are smaller pieces as well that hold that are just as intense, such as the verdant No. 21 or the astral No. 26, marked by swooshing patterns that communicate motion and strength.
Indeed, no two Wilwayco paintings are alike, let alone two viewings of the same piece. Much like how classical musicians intersperse hidden elements within the complex network of their creations, so, too, does the artist infuse millions of components that make his works appear different every time. There may be a web pattern here or root system there that wasn’t initially apparent, and those form part of the timelessness of Wilwayco’s abstractions.
Much like classical music, a Wilwayco painting, despite its age, never grows old.
