Purita Kalaw-Ledesma, the woman behind Philippine visual arts By Rowena C Burgos

Portrait of Purita Kalaw Ledesma. Oil on canvas by Fabian de la Rosa, 1932. [Kalaw-Ledesma Foundation Collection, image from Manila Nostalgia FB page]

Purita Kalaw-Ledesma, the woman behind Philippine visual arts

 by  Rowena C. Burgos      [Philippine Daily Inquirer, January 31, 2010]
She championed Philippine art at a time when there was low or practically no public regard for them. Ayala Museum will exhibit this week her trailblazing collection of Philippine masters. A revered name in artistic and cultural circles, the late Purita Kalaw-Ledesma will always be remembered for helping shape the direction of the visual arts and elevate the stature of Filipino artists.

She championed Philippine art when people were too busy picking up the pieces of their lives after the war, a time when few people paid any attention to artists or their work.

“My mother wanted to be an artist but since it was not a profession one’s family would like for their children at that time, she became a patron of the arts instead,” says Ada Mabilangan, one of Ledesma’s four daughters.

But Ledesma continued to paint as a hobby. Her subjects included her trips to China, nudes, landscape and portraits. She would often invite the Saturday Group of Artists to their house for painting sessions with a nude model.

“At that time, my sister and I lived across the street. Of course, our husbands were very interested in those sessions. My son who was only 5 years old then would see his grandmother sketching the nude model,” Mabilangan recalls.

Ledesma’s passion for the arts had been inspired by her mother Pura Villanueva-Kalaw (beauty queen, writer and suffragette) and father Teodoro M. Kalaw (an illustrious nationalist, scholar, historian, author and statesman).

“Our grandmother was an unusual woman at that time. She also had a lot of scholars who were mostly writers and poets,” Mabilangan says. “Our grandfather was the first director of the National Library. He was a very nationalistic man involved in independence missions under Quezon.”

Gentle soul

Underneath Ledesma’s gentle manner was an independent mind which she fearlessly expressed whenever she deemed it necessary.

“She was a quiet and gentle soul. She was never argumentative or confrontational. She was soft-spoken but she was made of steel. She would give way to things she considered minor but to those involving principle, for example, she wouldn’t budge. That’s why when she made a stand, people respected her,” Mabilangan says.

Ledesma never taught her daughters Rita, Ma. Consuelo, Wally and Ada how to paint. She would get art teachers for them instead. “But she never pushed us to make it a profession,” Mabilangan says. “She was a hundred-percent hands-on mom, even to her grandchildren. She would often verbalize to us that we were the most important in her life.”

Mabilangan also remembers how their mom would help her in her school projects. “When I was the editor of the Assumption College magazine, she would bring me to Cesar Legaspi who would help me with the magazine’s cover. At that time, who could have known that Legaspi would become National Artist? Unfortunately, I don’t have a copy of the cover he made.”

Like her father, Ledesma was “approachable.” She would tell her daughters how they joked with their dad. “They were sometimes irreverent with him. That was how we were with our mother,” Mabilangan says.

But the most admirable trait of her mother, Mabilangan says, was her insatiable appetite for knowledge. “She was always curious and she loved to learn.” As proof of this, Ledesma finished two master’s degrees: Education from UP in her late 40s and Art Education from the Asian Institute of Arts in her 70s.

Art collection

In the 1940s, Ledesma began collecting the artworks of most of her contemporaries: Vicente Manansala, Anita Magsaysay-Ho, Nena Saguil, Rosita Jose Guerrero, Carlos Francisco, Galo B. Ocampo, Cesar Legaspi, Alfredo Pestano, Emilio Aguilar Cruz, Jose Tupaz, Eduardo Salgado, Mario Felipe, Eduardo Perinond and Gabriel Custodio.

In her autobiography, “And Life Goes On,” Ledesma described them as “a humble lot. Most of them perhaps didn’t even dream that they would someday become the masters of Philippine contemporary art.”

In the early years, public esteem for artists was low. There was no such thing as an art market, and many academically trained artists ended up in the art department of a newspaper or advertising agency. Parents discouraged their children from pursuing art as a career because the common impression was that those who became painters were academic failures. Further, it was the common belief that there was no future in painting.

Ledesma had accumulated more than a thousand collection of paintings, sculptures and drawings of various artists from different generations.

A large part of Ledesma’s art collection has been donated to the Kalaw-Ledesma Foundation, which offers scholarships to deserving students.

Exhibit

On Feb. 3-May 2, the Ayala Museum will mount “A Vision of Philippine Art Selections From the Purita Kalaw-Ledesma Collection,” featuring “the best 50” pieces from the art patroness’ treasured collection. (In 2002, more than a hundred artworks from her collection were exhibited at the National Museum.)

Selected by Ditas Samson, curator of the Ayala Museum, the artworks to be exhibited will include some of Ledesma’s paintings and one done by her mother.

“The works were done by various artists who figured prominently in 20th-century Philippine art. They also go by generation. There are works by Fabian de la Rosa, Fernando Amorsolo, Magsaysay-Ho, Manansala, Legaspi, Arturo Luz, Fernando Zobel, Nunelucio Alvarado, Egai Fernandez. Viewers will see the development of Philippine art through the latter half of 20th century,” Samson says. “Purita’s collection completes and complements the narrative of the Ayala Museum’s collection. It also completes our work in making the public understand and appreciate Philippine culture.”

The exhibit will show the breadth and scope of Ledesma’s interests, Samson added, and how prolific and creative that period was, evident in the pieces from the ’50s and ’60s.

“Ledesma founded the Art Association of the Philippines (AAP) in 1948, a time when Filipinos were trying to find a visual language to express. As she was helping her artist friends, she accumulated her own collection,” Samson says.

But what was her favorite among her collection? “I think she loved them all. But toward the end of her life, she put the Fabian de la Rosa sketch of a woman on her dressing table. She especially loved this one for it looks peaceful,” says Mabilangan.

Arbiter of the arts

How did Ledesma become an arbiter of the visual arts? To begin with, she had a solid background in the arts, having enrolled at the Escuela de Bellas Artes, later to be incorporated into the University of the Philippines’ School of Fine Arts. It had some of the leading artists as her mentors: Dean Fabian de la Rosa, portraiture; Guillermo E. Tolentino, perspective; Ramon Peralta, drawing; Teodoro Buenaventura and Fernando Amorsolo, landscape; Toribio Herrera, anatomy; Pablo Amorsolo, drawing from life; Vicente Rivera y Mir, drapery; and Irineo Miranda, watercolor composition and decorative art.

Once, in Miranda’s class in portraiture, Ledesma had to sit as substitute model and it was Botong Francisco’s turn to make a pen-and-ink portrait of the model. The portrait signed by the artist is in Ledesma’s collection.

After taking lessons for three years at the Escuela de Bellas Artes, Ledesma went to the University of Michigan where she studied Design, Oriental History and the Appreciation of Visual Arts and Crafts.

Her parents subscribed to the common notion that a career in art could not support her, related Mabilangan. Thus, Ledesma gave in to their wish that she take up Home Economics after her return. She also followed the advice of her mother to turn to real estate which Ledesma did, succeeding immensely in it. She used the income from real estate to help younger, struggling artists.

Realizing how necessary it was to raise the stature of artists in the esteem of the public, she founded the AAP. Its charter members unanimously voted Ledesma president.

Out at Sea, Relaxing in the Philippines

By DAN LEVIN

[Published: March 9, 2012 New York Times]

We were floating gingerly over a forest of antler-shaped coral when I heard a Swede who was snorkeling with me shout. I popped my head above water and caught only a fragment of his declaration in the slosh of waves: “Monster in a hole.”

Pulling the mask from my eyes, I suddenly felt extremely exposed. We were snorkeling in the waters off Palawan province in the Philippines, and the 82-foot blue-and-white bangka boat that was our home for five days was too far away for a quick escape.

So I readjusted my snorkel, inhaled and pumped down toward the reef. Some members of our 19-member sailing expedition were already there, peering into an orange coral bigger than an armchair. That meant the creature was not lethal. But it did look hungry. Half hidden in a crevice loomed a long speckled predator, jaws agape. I kept my distance and made a mental note to teach my Scandinavian friend a new name: moray eel. But first, I needed to breathe.

Fortunately, relaxation was never in short supply aboard the Buhay. We were in the middle of nowhere, paradise-style: a sea of high-definition azure stretching to the horizon, dotted only by distant uninhabited islands. After a few days of sailing, life had become a hazy routine: eat, snorkel, chill out. Repeat.

Most tourists who land in the Philippines for some r-and-r head straight to Boracay, a tropical convenience store fully stocked with jet skis, resort pools and hangovers. But I wanted a real getaway, not one that involved getting hammered on scorpion bowls.

So I hitched a van ride from Puerto Princesa to El Nido, a tiny, dense warren of dive shops that clings to Bacuit Bay in Palawan. What I found, after six hours swerving around goats along a dirt road, was a bangka launching pad to the region’s spectacular islands.

El Nido has carved out a niche on the backpacker circuit by looking as if it just popped up on the map. Towering limestone cliffs fringe a few dusty streets that clear out long before midnight. Resorts are kept at bay by a lack of commercial flights and the town’s creaky infrastructure — there are no A.T.M.’s and the electricity shuts off at dawn, sputtering back on around 4 p.m.

Like most of the town’s itinerant denizens, I spent the brownout hours swimming with parrotfish and picnicking on a flash of white sand. Each spot had a name ripped from paradise mythology, like Hidden Beach and Secret Lagoon.

Except the secret is out. Local tour operators all offer the same four daily itineraries — known as A, B, C and D — so the water, while stunning, was sometimes crowded. When everyone came back to town in the afternoon, they would watch the sunset, order a beer and promptly log on to Facebook at a cafe just feet from the surf. It felt as if the other tourists (and the Internet) were crashing my deserted-island fantasy.

The only option was to cut anchor from civilization and all its modern amenities. In planning my next trip to El Nido in February, I booked online with the bespoke sailing outfit Tao Philippines, which not only explores some of the most remote islands in Southeast Asia, but also offers a total digital holiday: no e-mail, no newsfeed, no phone.

Tao was founded by Eddie Brock, a lanky 34-year-old Filipino, and his British buddy, Jack Foottit, 27, who met waiting tables in Scotland, then lit out for the islands of Palawan. Over the years, Mr. Brock and Mr. Foottit discovered an echt lonely planet of untrammeled islets and fishing villages and, so they could keep the adventure going, began taking those in the know along for the ride. They now have six bangkas, and my shipmates and I were their latest stowaways.

The point of the trip, Mr. Brock said the night before we set out, was simple: “There is no plan.” During our voyage between El Nido and our final destination, Coron, nearly 100 miles to the northeast, each day’s course would be set by the winds and currents. Along the way we would land on islands so isolated that tourists rarely see them.

That first morning aboard the Buhay, we ditched our flip-flops and tested our sea legs. The vessel was a typical bangka reimagined, with double open-air decks and two guitars. In the galley, our chef, Annie, would whip up Filipino island gems during our journey, like tuna adobo and coconut crab curry.

My shipmates aboard the Buhay were mostly European, including two Belgian men trailed by their comely Filipina companions. It was an open expedition, so anyone could book a spot. Each night we slept on a different island, sometimes sharing a hut. Honeymooners and others wanting a more intimate experience can reserve a private boat.

I had come on my own, but by the time we landed at Tao’s base camp on the island of Cadlao that afternoon, any initial discomfort at sharing such close quarters with strangers had vanished in the first plunge overboard. (Being wet and half-naked does that.)

Mr. Brock emerged from the palms to welcome us ashore, followed by Mr. Foottit, a tanned ex-Londoner who traded his car keys for a pet monkey.  The baby long-tailed macaque jumped down from his shoulder, squeaked and scampered across the sand to sniff us out. She was an ideal mascot for the camp, a few thatch huts on the edge of jungle.

Fishermen once lived in the area but sold their land to our hosts a few years ago. Today, some of them work for Tao as sailors and cooks. Tao supports each village they work with throughout the islands, building schools and paying for teachers, an investment that has won them local loyalties. Our crew members were from this rural landscape, and they had taught our hosts how to shinny up a coconut tree and navigate by the stars. “It’s a tribe, not a company,” said Mr. Foottit, grinning over a beer. “We’re the lost boys.”

Clambering aboard the Buhay the next morning, we felt like a tribe of our own. The sun was high and the air smelled of salt and sunscreen. Over the slap of wave on hull I could hear the strumming of guitar strings and laughter, my kind of symphony. We were lying belly-up on the prow when Nina Peck, a strawberry-blond Liverpudlian, asked what, at that moment, sounded like life’s most important question: “Is it beer o’clock yet?”

All I knew was that we had yet to feast on lunch, so the bottles of lager would get to chill a bit longer. We resumed watching the clouds, content to wait for the next empty beach ahead.

When the Buhay stopped, Johan, our Filipino expedition leader, announced that just beneath the waves, a World War II-era shipwreck sat waiting to be explored. We raced to snag snorkels, leapt overboard and found a vessel upholstered by coral. Clown fish darted toward our masks from anemones that clung to the rusted hull. It was a submerged playground, complete with portholes big enough to swim through.

Suddenly Nina grabbed my arm and pointed toward the sea floor. There, a cuttlefish was frozen in panic, rapidly flashing green, motley and fluorescent beige like a chameleon on speed.

All this nautical freedom was affecting my shipmates. Before starting the trip, Marly Pols, 43, a Dutch flight attendant, said she had only thought of the beaches in store. But by the second day we were sharing tales and bottles of rum like a band of leisurely pirates. “This is our home now,” she said as we lounged on the top deck the next morning. “We’re in this together.”

Gabie Vervoort, 37, a successful printer salesman in the Netherlands, said he was toying with giving that up. “Back home I want the nicest car and biggest TV, but out here it’s all meaningless,” he said. “I think I was born in the wrong country.”

Yet island life is not always paradise. Rising sea temperatures and overfishing in the Philippines are devastating populations above and below the waves. Fish collapse has begun to hit Palawan, leaving local fishermen unable to compete in the race to feed China. Pearl farming provides some employment (at night we glimpsed the distant lights of bangkas guarding the submerged oysters), though locals receive a fraction of the final profit.

Tao supports a small rural economy that spans the Philippine archipelago. Our morning coffee came from Mr. Brock’s village up north, while dinners were strictly locavore. When we stopped for the night on an island several hours away from the shipwreck, a large boar was roasting on a spit rotated by a barefoot villager. Tao owns 30 acres of the island, turning part of it into a banana plantation with room for eggplant, lemon cucumbers and tomatoes. We dropped off our dry bags in bamboo huts carpeted with sand and, after showering, sat down to eat.

I prefer my pork without a face, but the others did not have such qualms, slurping on morsels of cracklin in the torchlight. Later, we relaxed by the beach until late, mangling the words to Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car” and Red Hot Chili Peppers songs.

On the third evening, on another beach, the lyrics were provided. After sunset and prawns, we assembled in a hut around the reason for the village’s generator: a karaoke machine. English was not the mother tongue of all of my shipmates, but they made up for any mistakes with their fluency in American-Brit pop.
 
We sang Oasis’s “Wonderwall” and danced the Macarena. For days I’d been wishing that my friends had come with me on the voyage, and then I realized: they were there the whole time.

Taking a breather, I crept barefoot off to the beach, empty save for the ghost crabs who hovered by their burrows, watching me with googly-eyes. The tide was a sigh, the sky aglow with constellations, and I was, thrillingly, the only witness.

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Bangka or banca is a local, and mostly double outrigger canoe or boat.

Tao - in Tagalog or Pilipino language meant the local man or native. "Man" being a generalized term for mankind or people.

Buhay - in Tagalog or Pilipino language is "life".

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/11/travel/an-aimless-sailing-trip-off-palawan-in-the-philippines.html