ART & CULTURE
BenCab Museum:
Story & Photography by Jeck Simbulan
His Heart & Legacy
I must have stared for more than five minutes like a gypsy on the streets. Until now the folded drapes covering her bending body and the open-face hand resting on her chest remains in me as I head back to where I am lodging in Baguio City. She has found an intimate connection straight to my heart. It’ s admiration, curiosity, and grief in just one shroud.
Her name is“ Sabel”, the lady in BenCab’ s life, and is one of his most coveted subjects as a painter. It is connection and first impression that most artists want to impart to their audience. Upon looking at some of BenCab’ s works, like the Filipino ancestral characters existing in the present found in“ Larawan”, or gazing at the instinctive care found in his interpretation of the genuine Filipino family in“ Familia”, the viewer can immaculately relate and create a unique bond with the subjects as if viewing them in real life. Things like these make the works of BenCab, and things like that made him a National Artist for Visual Arts on 2006.
Bulol Installation, collection of Ifugao Rice deities.
BenCab Gallery features his own works. You’ ll also find Sabel here in her most glorious form.
The Museum on The Hill
BenCab’ s simple pleasures present their beauty during my interview with him. From our table in Café Sabel we enjoy freshly brewed Cordillera coffee with the sliding doors open letting the cool afternoon pine breeze play within the cafe.
At BenCab’ s Hill, I can say the artist is in his comfort zone as he gives me a tour of the garden. Talking about his plants, he remembers the origin of a certain tree, what his intentions were when planting ferns beside a nearby natural waterfall. He need not say where he draws his inspiration. He confesses that during dawn, he is nowhere to be found, but in his garden.
“ These are not just my works. Some are from my art collections.” The three-storey museum, with wide open spaces complemented by high ceilings, extraordinarily lit white walls, and terraces overlooking Benguet’ s mountains, preserves BenCab’ s permanent art collection.
Being first in the Philippines, it houses different galleries, the BenCab Gallery containing his 4-decade masterpieces starting from the 60’ s, that’ s from London to Manila, then finally in Baguio.
The Cordillera Gallery, which the artist has dedicated to collecting tribal crafts from rice gods“ Bulol” up to the tribes first weapons for livelihood and hunting.
The Maestro Gallery, where BenCab exemplified taste on art pieces from Luz and Joya, just to name a few, are displayed for visitor’ s appreciation.
Finally, the gallery I admire the most, Gallery Indigo, in which BenCab gives chances to other contemporary artists to exhibit their pieces, with of course his“ say” prior to the exhibit. With eight galleries, two patios, a hall or a function room, a café on the fourth level, and a museum shop … a one-day trip in BenCab Museum is never enough. While the admission fee( Php100) worried me as a budget traveler, knowing where part of the proceeds go and what the true intentions of the museum are and will be, makes me want to go back on any given Sunday.
Beneath Sabel’ s Drapes is BenCab’ s Legacy
Sabel’ s thick drapes, suggests something is hidden beneath the swaddled image. Even the way these drapes naturally fold gives us clues about her flight to escape reality and her struggles.
BenCab, or Benedicto Cabrera’ s earlier years as a student and artist was never easy. Coming from a family of nine children, his father borrowed money so he could finish school. Now, as if always a part of his paintings, BenCab is reciprocating the blessings he has been receiving from his arts. He tells me it is payback time and to me the mystery beneath Sabel’ s guarded gesture is a heart ready to lend a helping hand.
After the 1990 Baguio earthquake, togeth-
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