March 2, 2012, Manila, Philippines: The eight national winners of the 2012 Philippine Art Awards (PAA) have been honored during the awarding ceremony and formal opening of exhibition at the Museum of the Filipino People at Rizal Park Manila.

Chris Nelson, President of PMFTC, Inc, said in his message, “As we strengthen our community projects all over the country, we truly take pleasure collaborating with the sectors promoting Philippine culture and the arts. That is why through the past seventeen years, we have striven to continuously improve on our Philippine Art Awards and expand its essential infrastructure of expertise and resources on which its consistent credibility and public recognition is founded.”

Bayen Elero, Corporate Affairs Director thanked the partners of Philippine Art Awards without whose support, the PAA would have not done its tasked for the past seventeen years. She said “through the years, PAA, has maintained its preeminent status particularly due to the consistent support of our national as well as regional partners all over the country, and generally, by the eagerly growing participation of the Filipino visual artists nationwide.”

Aside from cash prizes, all eight winners received a trophies designed by National Artist Napoleon Abueva, a trip to the forthcoming Hongkong Art Fair in May. The winners were to keep the winning entries as well.

Said Cedie Vargas, a member of the panel of judges who announced the winners said “sitting alternately all throughout the selection process, the members of panel have come to the happy

conclusion that the artists have greatly improved their craft, not only in terms of their artistic skills, but of how they expressively see the world. As our colleague, Dr. Patrick in his curatorial introduction to the exhibit we are about to see, says, and I paraphrase: In this exhibition of art across the islands, we see many signs of commentary on an earth and its humanity in peril. We are confronted with images of violence and pestilence, of excess and scarcity. We are struck by the burden of the past and the anxiety of the future. Some artists prefigure an apocalypse, a deluge that will engulf the folly of it all. Others, divine a future of travel and migration, of the greater flux of people and goods, in the end charting the “geography of the possible” … and through its many artistic forms—that is what being ‘contemporary’ ought to be. ”

Three Jurors Choice of Merit who received eighty thousand pesos each are :

1. “Louie Talents” Ano-os was born in Cagayan de Oro, but is now a resident of Mandaluyong City for his work which transformed biblical passages into diary entries, entitled “Burn Out 4”;

2. Arel Zambarrano, for his work entitled “Homecoming”. Arel is from the Western Visayas College of Science and Technology, and a resident of Iloilo,

3. Arturo Sanchez of Binangonan, Rizal for his work entitled “Between Real Time Connection”

For the Juror’s Award for Excellence, the panel of judges has selected four winners who received one hundred twenty thousand each:

1. The sculptural work entitled ”Portrait of a Filipino as Conceptual Artist,” by Ronald Hilario who originally hails from Vigan, Ilocos Sur, and is now a resident of Marikina City.

2. Manuel Lotsu Manes from PWU for his work entitled “Philippine Deep”.

3. Dexter Sy from FEU for his work entitled “Souvenir” as our third winner.

4. Entitled “Ang Mananahi ng Buhay at ang Makinang na Makina” won Raffy T. Napay of the E Rodriguez Institute of Science and Technology this award.

The Grand Prize is unanimously awarded to

1. The work entitled “Ang Walang Humpay na Harana ni Temyong kay Magda” Manila-born artist who has made Cagayan de Oro his home, Jericho Valijusto Vamenta.

The exhibition featuring all the eight national winners and the other thirty two regional winners are on view at the North wing Gallery of the Museum of the Filipino People beginning March 3.