Mark Salvatus unveils the ethno-ecologies of Mt Banahaw and Lucban for the Philippine Pavilion at the 60th Venice Art Biennale

Curator Carlos Quijon, Jr approached Puli’s words as a stage that invites visitors to take pause and ponder on what’s impending, as a stage “that is a theatre of objects, materials, and encounters with these materials”, and as a stage which scenography in its backstage and wings prepares visitors to the main event that is Banahaw.

“As one walks, traversing the exhibition, there are a lot of distinct visual stimuli that simultaneously happen, creating a unique encounter with artworks from the entry to the exit,” Quijon describes.

The exhibition includes Salvatus’s newly commissioned video installation, which explores Mount Banahaw’s vitality and its profound connections to broader narratives of faith, mysticism, and revolution. The artist also worked with Lucban-based musicians, particularly the Young Banahaw Orchestra, Banda Banahaw, and the Babat Orchestra, to showcase their stories and ongoing musical legacy, broadening the discourse on migration, identity, and the shaping of modern soundscapes in the Asia Pacific region.

Read more: Bamboo music, Philippines’ forgotten art? Banda Kawayan founder Ka Fred Calabig’s two cents

Salvatus and Quijon worked together for the first time in 2018 for the Philippine Pavilion at the Gwangju Biennale, curated by Dr Patrick Flores. At the time, Quijon assisted Flores as the overall curatorial coordinator for the project that glued together the several artists involved in the exhibition. There, Quijon was introduced to Salvatus’s oeuvre, which is marked by his mastery of assemblage. Quijon started curating exhibitions a year later, but not until 2022 did he and Salvatus begin working as artist-curators. 

Quijon stumbled upon Salvatus’s Mount Banahaw work in one of the exhibitions at UP Vargas Museum. It was an archival image of an exhibition in Lucban, which Quijon recalls as having a futuristic sci-fi design motif. “There was an image of a group of people, and behind them was an arc, with a spaceship on its design,” Quijon says.

Salvatus had been working on the Banahaw project in video format since before the pandemic. As he looked back and shared with Tatler, he said that perhaps Quijon had seen the progression of the Banahaw project. “Every time we show it, it’s in a different format or transforming into a different entity. It’s nice to work with someone who sees the work in different forms or can see something else in it,” Salvatus said.

Read more: Inside a Curator‘s Mind: Dr Patrick Flores on what the Philippine art scene needs today

The 16-minute video Kung ang Makagiginhawa ay Matingnan ng Ating mga Mata (Should the Source of Fulfillment Be Seen with Our Eyes) serves a central role in the exhibition. Other elements include the soundscapes of a forested mountain that highlight the surreal experience of hiking Mount Banahaw and some fabric work that plays with light and shadows. Salvatus said that he didn’t want to literally showcase Mount Banahaw in Venice but “created a treatment, a theatrical experience... that plays around the idea of being enchanted or ‘napaglaruan ng mga engkanto’,” the artist explains.

Mount Banahaw is a three-peaked forested mountain located on the boundary between Laguna and Quezon. Since childhood, it has served as a witness, muse, and inspiration to the artist, towering over the municipality of Lucban. It has been part of his daily life, and he sees it wherever he goes. His thirst to understand it deeply was greatly influenced by his grandfather, who was a poet, local historian and elementary school teacher.

Read more: Beyond Venice Art Biennale: 7 exhibitions to see if you are headed to the art showcase in Italy

“He had many collections of photographs of Banahaw and Lucban, and when he died, I found many from his archives. Maybe he was telling the locals, mostly his readers, to take care of Banahaw. But in a sense, he was not direct or outright vocal in expressing that,” Salvatus shares.

Having seldom visited Lucban in adulthood, Salvatus found these archives, literature, and photographs of Banahaw and Lucban as opportunities to reconnect with his roots. Then he began building the imaginary museum Museo ng Banahaw, which was later presented by the artist-run space Project Space Pilipinas in a group show that tackles self-identity.

“I think it has many layers because I grew up in Lucban, a small town famous for the Pahiyas Festival. Banahaw also does not only represent land but has also been an entryway to realise oneself, as evident in the local revolution started by Hermano Puli, which is a refuge for members of the Communist Party of the Philippines or the National People’s Army. Lastly, different religious sects have seen Banahaw as an energy source for renewal. It is relevant to discourses on energies, mystery, and life force. We can also see its artistic connection with the locals as it has always inspired them to write poetry, make music, and visual art,” Salvatus says.

Salvatus’s Museo ng Banahaw continues to be an ongoing project first seen by Quijon at the Vargas Museum.

“What interests me in Mark’s practice is that it is interdisciplinary,” Quijon says. “It requires the collaboration of a number of people—specialists, experts, and practitioners. It gives us an idea of how a contemporary artist functions and, more often than not, works with many other people. Here, we see the community of ideas and how an artist entrusts this to others.”

The Philippine participation at the Venice Art Biennale is a collaborative undertaking of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA), the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), and the Office of Senate President Pro Tempore Loren Legarda. The current commissioner of the Philippine Pavilion is NCCA chairman Victorino Manalo, who worked alongside Aurea Brigino (head of the PAVB), Manuel Agustin Singson (exhibition manager), Jeanne Melissa Severo (overall coordinator), and Ana Lorraine Manalaysay (support staff). Bai Pendatun-Ilagan handled the publicity and social media tasks, while all the tasks in Venice were accomplished in collaboration with Darwin Gutierrez (Venice-based coordinator and head docent), with UP Vargas Museum’s Flores as the project adviser. In carrying out this important undertaking, PAVB collaborated with the Philippine Embassy in Rome, currently under Ambassador Nathaniel Imperial, and with the Philippine Consulate General in Milan through Consul General Elmer Cato. Young female graphic designer Alexandra Paredes was also instrumental in crafting the visual identity of the exhibition.

“Another thing that interests me is the way he handles materials. There is this particular amateur and playful tendency. It’s very exploratory and filled with wonder, and that’s appealing to me because it’s an endless discovery of things that are not necessarily known to everyone,” Quijon adds. “Having explored the musicians’ relationship with Mount Banahaw, the discourses of mysticism revolving around the mountain, and its political history, I think it’s a generative way of thinking about artistic research with the idea of openness, wonder, exploration, and discovery. This productive exchange of ideas makes this pavilion a healthy conversation between the curator and the artist.

The collaborative exploration of the mysteries of Mount Banahaw resulted in “a pavilion that is an assemblage of vernacular and popular histories that sketches out the contours of the contemporary at the cusp of a post-pandemic world.” In Puli’s words, the pavilion invites people to discern the “meaning of the times”, awareness of what is imminent, and hope for what lies beyond. In the context of Puli, freedom and victory may be on the other side of the curtain. For Salvatus, we are just in our rehearsal. For Quijion, we take a pause and wait for things to unfold.

“With the dynamics surrounding Mount Banahaw at the centre of the Philippine Pavilion’s exhibition in this year’s Biennale Arte, it underscores that the convergence of nature, spirituality, culture, and art serves as a vivid testament to the braided relationships that are woven in our world,” Senator Loren Legarda expresses. “Mount Banahaw stands not just as a geographical landmark but as a spiritual epicentre, a cultural hub, and a source of artistic inspiration. This exhibition invites the global audience to contemplate the interconnectedness of these facets within the Filipino experience. It reminds us that nature is not just a backdrop but an active participant in our cultural narratives, that spirituality is an intrinsic part of our subjectivity, that culture is an index of our deep-rooted beliefs, and that art is the medium that enables us to communicate and celebrate these truths.”

Quijon strongly believes that this year’s Philippine Pavilion will offer foreign visitors a different approach to understanding what is presented to them. Quijon and Salvatus translated a national symbol’s mystical experience to a visceral one at the heart of the hustle and bustle of the Venice Art Biennale.

“It’s also a way for us to think about how such a local symbol, a local narrative, can become universal through the exhibition. The theatricality of the mystical would be interesting to the public who will experience this space. It’s a way to offer rest for these people walking from one pavilion to another.”

Meanwhile, Salvatus exhibited his masterful eye for abstraction in this pavilion, presenting an experience of various elements that maximised the physicality of the Arsenale’s space. In this interdisciplinary work, he presented a multisensorial approach for visitors to immerse in, much like climbing a mountain.

“When you go to Mount Banahaw, you get lost, too. You go to a mountain because you don’t want to understand the work or complicate the world. Those realisations come to you when you go down.”

NOW READ

Biennale Arte 2024: ‘Seeing Forest’ by Singapore artist Robert Zhao Rhenhui explores secondary forests and the interplay between nature and humanity

The never-ending plight of the Philippines’ Masungi Georeserve

Enter a Multi-Sensory Filipino Exhibition at the 59th Venice Arts Biennale