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http://news.inq7.net/lifestyle/index.php?index=1&story_id=43042Ronaldo Ruiz's vision and polish
First posted 11:01pm (Mla time) July 10, 2005
By Constantino Tejero
Inquirer
TO HAVE held a solo show in the ample exhibition area of the Art Center is usually seen in the local art circle as a gauge that the artist has arrived.
But whether or not Ronaldo Ruiz ever put up an exhibit there should be irrelevant. We have long regarded this young artist of considerable talent to have long arrived.
To celebrate Ruiz's 13th year as artist, Renaissance Art Gallery recently presented his 11th one-man exhibit, "Refreshed," 29 medium-to-large pieces and 100 small panels in acrylic and mixed media (fiber, sand, modeling paste) on canvas, in the Art Center at the Artwalk, L/4, Bldg. A, SM Megamall, Mandaluyong City.
Says the exhibit note: "It recaps the development of his art since he started his series of abstract paintings based on themes of technology, struggle and life in the contemporary world. His Filipino identity is seen in the daily struggle to transform his experiences of living in Metro Manila into an artistic practice of colors, textures and patterns which are disciplined through sublimation, complementation and balance between positive and negative, yin and yang, struggle and fulfillment."
While most artists who use mixed media just jumble or haphazardly juxtapose the disparate materials on the canvas, every piece by Ruiz looks carefully handcrafted.
His art has a polish hitherto unseen in many of his contemporaries. His vision may be recondite, but the resulting pieces are visually appealing.
They range from small to mural-size, from vertical to horizontal format, either square or rectangle. As seen in the artist's previous exhibits, they are still dominated by green, red, gold and blue, vigorously applied. And they carry computer terms for titles: "Server,"Hardware," "Cyberspace," "Upgrade," "Link," "Network," "Loading," "Passwords," "Log in," "Memory," "Start up," "My Document A-H" (consisting of eight panels), "Restore A & B" (diptych), "Interactive A-E" (polyptych), "Pixels" (100 panels).
We don't know, of course, how these specific titles are related to the particular hues and shapes we see on the canvas. Their inspiration could be quite personal to the artist that each piece looks esoteric.
Ruiz is also a performance artist of some skill, imagination and daring, performing from Bulacan to Tokyo, from Rizal Park and the Philcoa overpass to Sydney and Bangkok. He is the convenor of Tupada, the performance art collaborative events.
For the 13-day duration of this exhibit, he did a performance called "Third Eye" in the stockroom behind the Art Center. He appropriated that enclosed area as his "exclusive abode and installation site," where he did his daily routine "as artist and normal human being."
This was monitored on a TV screen through a miniature camera attached to his forehead. Audiences could view the performance in the exhibition area.
A Fine Arts graduate from University of the East, Ruiz was twice awarded the Jurors' Choice at the Art Association of the Philippines annual competition; twice the Jurors' Choice at the Philip Morris Philippine Art Awards; Best Entry in the AAP Centennial Painting Contest.
In 2003, he was given the Thirteen Artists Award by the Cultural Center of the Philippines-regarded by many as the surest indication that a Filipino artist has truly arrived.
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