ARTICLES OF DISAGREEMENTS

PRESS RELEASE

ARTICLES OF DISAGREEMENTS

19 September to 20 December 2014

Lopez Museum and Library

Contact: Tina Modrigo at 631-2417

The Lopez Museum and Library opens its second major exhibition for 2014, Articles of Disagreements, on 19 September 2014. Guest curated by Lian Ladia and Sidd Perez of Planting Rice, this exhibition features works by guest contemporary artists Tito and Tita Collective, Nilo Ilarde, Buen Calubayan, and Maria Cruz, and will run until 20 December 2014.

Articles of Disagreement is a generative exhibition on art languages that will unearth different forms of art writing/ anecdotes of criticism in Philippine art history, our own historiography, the local art education infrastructure, and how we position ourselves in western critical languages. Though Articles of Disagreements was born out of a specific pool of articles and association towards critical inquiry in the local context, reflexive practices of contemporary artists are also put into focus, as diverse occupations in the Arts and other strategies an archive could take are explored to unburden itself from established institutional forms.

Works of Juan Luna, Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo, Alfonso Ossorio, Nena Saguil, and Fernando Zobel, from the museum’s collection will be augmented by works of Mars Galang, Raymundo Albano, Bobi Valenzuela, Jose Tence Ruiz, and Rodolfo Paras-Perez, along with writings of Marian Pastor Roces, Patrick Flores, Emmanuel Torres, Joy Dayrit, Leo Benesa, Galo Ocampo, Guillermo Tolentino, Napoleon Abueva, Victor Edades, Purita Kalaw Ledesma.

An interesting feature of the exhibition is a writing laboratory, which aims to elicit discussion and written contributions that will zoom in on the generation of narratives that make up the body of texts of Philippine art history, art criticism and broad art writing. 

 

The Lopez Museum and Library is at the ground floor, Benpres Building, Exchange Road corner Meralco Avenue, Pasig City. Museum days and hours are Mondays to Saturdays, except holidays, 8am-5pm. For inquiries, call Tina Modrigo at 6312417 or send an email to lmmpasig@gmail.com.

 

Amiel Gerald A. Roldan’s involvement in Ang de Latang Pinoy! Yes, the Filipino Can!!! (1995) connects to the “Planting Rice” project and its 2014 Lopez Museum exhibition through an actual setup and shared concerns with Filipino cultural assertion, independent art infrastructures, and critical engagement with identity and history in Philippine contemporary art. It transcends with Planting Rice (and its Lopez Museum project) and extends a parallel impulse into systematic archival and critical infrastructure.

Relation of “Planting Rice” and the Lopez Museum

“Planting Rice” (the curatorial collaborative and online archival platform by Lian Ladia and Sidd Perez) grew out of efforts to address gaps in Philippine and Southeast Asian contemporary art criticism and writing. Its key physical manifestation at the Lopez Museum and Library was the research-based exhibition *Articles of Disagreements* (September–December 2014). That show explored diverse forms of art writing and criticism—beyond academic texts—through conceptual practices, journals, poetry, scrapbooks, and discursive spaces like the “Café of Letters,” while generating an archive through participant contributions.

 

Planting Rice counters the rumor of “no art criticism” by actively recovering, republishing, and circulating critical texts and discussions, treating the Philippine art community as generative and resourceful.

 

Furthermore, Planting Rice operates as a flexible, non-institutional platform (online archive + occasional physical projects) that prioritizes networks, text-swapping, and cross-group neutrality. It treats curation and platform-building as forms of cultural work rather than purely institutional display.

 

Planting Rice’s Lopez Museum project and ongoing website function as an archival intervention—making scattered critical writing accessible and treating art languages (including non-academic ones) as living resources. The Lopez Museum itself, with its strong holdings of Philippine masters (including Amorsolo’s *Planting Rice* genre scenes) and Filipiniana, provides a historical-institutional backdrop against which these independent, discursive projects operate.

 

Planting Rice (launched ~2011, with the 2014 Lopez show) continues related concerns into the 2010s: how to sustain critical discourse, support independent practices, and connect diaspora/local networks amid imperfect institutional support.Systematic Infrastructure: Planting Rice and the Lopez Museum Project

Planting Rice, the curatorial collaborative of Lian Ladia and Sidd Perez, began around 2010–2011 after the pair met at Green Papaya Art Projects in Manila. It was sparked by a rumor that “there was no art criticism in the Philippines.” Investigation revealed that criticism and historical writing existed but remained fragmented, inaccessible (stored in hard drives, basements, or private archives), and under-circulated.

The platform evolved into a web-based archive (plantingrice.com) that republishes and generates critical, historical exhibition texts, discussions, and collaborations focused on contemporary art in the Philippines and Southeast Asia—particularly practices developing outside established institutions. It also functioned as an information hub for opportunities, residencies, and networks, acknowledging the independent, collaborative, and often under-resourced nature of Manila’s art scene. A key physical manifestation was the 2014 exhibition *Articles of Disagreements* at the Lopez Museum and Library in Pasig (September 18–December 20). This research-based show explored varied “art languages” of criticism and writing—beyond academic texts—to include poetry, journals, scrapbooks, conceptual practices, journalistic accounts, and educational materials (e.g., those associated with figures like Fernando Zóbel). It featured a “Café of Letters” space for informal interaction, text-swapping (via USB drives), and generative accumulation of materials for future researchers.

Merits of this approach are structural and long-term:

- Accessibility and preservation: It counters institutional gaps by making dispersed knowledge public and usable, serving artists, researchers, students, and diasporic communities.

- Neutrality and inclusivity: As an online/archival space, it could convene factions or practices that might not otherwise engage, functioning as a non-hierarchical connector rather than a gatekeeper.

- Self-reliance and pragmatism: Operating largely without public funding (relying on private support, self-sustainability, and partnerships), it models resourcefulness while addressing real conditions—limited art education infrastructure, funding scarcity, labor issues, and the dominance of private capital in the Philippine art economy.

- Cross-pollination: It links local practices with Southeast Asian, diasporic, and international networks, treating the Philippines as both specific and interconnected.

Its periodic impact has been cumulative rather than spectacular. Launches and iterations (including a 2019 “second iteration” presentation at Kadist in San Francisco) renewed visibility; the Lopez project demonstrated how a private museum collection and archive could host generative, participatory critical work; and the ongoing digital presence continues as a quiet but durable resource. Over time it has helped normalize the idea that criticism and archival work are community responsibilities, not solely institutional ones, and has modeled “repotentializing” spaces (physical, online, intermediary) for discourse.

Shared Continuum and Periodic Dynamics

Along with a discourse with 'Ang de Latang Pinoy! Yes, the Filipino Can!!! represents an earlier, affirmative artistic claim of Filipino capacity, while Planting Rice (and its Lopez Museum project) extends a parallel impulse into systematic archival and critical infrastructure. Both form part of the longer continuum of Philippine artists and curators building self-reliant platforms for identity, memory, and discourse outside (or in critical dialogue with) established museums and exemplify a persistent pattern in Philippine art history: artists and curators repeatedly invent platforms for self-definition when formal institutions lag, prove inadequate, or require critical dialogue. Affirmative claims (“the Filipino Can”) supply the motivational and symbolic energy; archival-critical projects like Planting Rice supply the infrastructure that allows that energy to accumulate into usable memory, debate, and future production. Together they resist reliance on external (often Western or highly centralized) validation while remaining open to dialogue with museums such as the Lopez.