National Artists of The Philippines

The National Artist Award is the highest distinction
bestowed upon Filipino Artists whose body of work is

recognized by their peers and more importantly by
their countrymen as sublime expression of Philippine
music, dance, theatre, visual arts, literature, film
and media, arts, architecture and design.
President Ferdinand E. Marcos through proclamation

no.1001 dated April 2 1972, confers the award to
deserving individuals as recommended by the Cultural
Center of the Philippines (CCP) and the National
Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA).
Criteria
• Living artists who have been Filipino citizens

for the last ten years prior to nomination as
well as those who have died after the
establishment of the award in 1972 but were
Filipino citizens at the time of their death;
• Artists who have helped build a Filipino sense of

nationhood through the content and form of their
works;
• Artists who have distinguished themselves by

pioneering in a mode of creative expression or
style, making an impact on succeeding generations
of artists;
• Artists who have created a significant body of

works and/or have consistently displayed
excellence in the practice of their art form,
enriching artistic expression or style; and
• Artists who enjoy broad acceptance through

prestigious national and/or international
recognition, awards in prestigious national
and/or international events, critical acclaim
and/or reviews of their works, and/or respect and
esteem from peers within an artistic discipline.
PAINTING
Fernando Cueto Amorsolo

National Artist for Painting(VISUAL ARTS) (1973)
(May 30, 1892 – February 26, 1972)
Fernando Cueto Amorsolo is one of the most celebrated
artists of the Philippines, and the first to be
designated a National Artist. He is a portraitist and
painter of Philippine rural landscapes and is
particularly noted for his brushwork and his skill in
depicting light.
Among others, his major works include the
following: Maiden in a Stream(1921)-GSIS
collection; El Ciego (1928)-Central Bank of the
Philippines collection; Dalagang Bukid (1936) – Club
Filipino collection; The Mestiza (1943) – National
Museum of the Philippines collection; Planting
Rice (1946)-UCPB collection; Sunday Morning Going to
Town (1958)-Ayala Museum Collection.
Carlos “Botong” Francisco,

National Artist for Painting (1973)
(November 4, 1912 – March 31, 1969)
Popularly known as "Botong", was a distinguished

muralist from and best known for his historical
pieces. Also known as the Poet of Angono, Rizal he
single-handedly brought back the art of mural
painting in Philippines. He was one of the of the
modernist artists together with Galo Ocampo and
Victorio Edades known as " The Triumvirate" who broke
away from romanticism style of Fernando Amorsolo's
Philippine Scenes.
His major works includes Portrait of Purita, The

Invasion of Limahong, Serenade, Muslim Betrothal,
Blood Compact, First Mass at Limasawa, The Martyrdom
of Rizal, Bayanihan, Magpupukot, Fiesta, Bayanihan sa
Bukid and Sandugo. His major masterpiece is the mural
for Bulwagang Katipunan of the Manila City Hall.
He was the second Filipino who received the title of

National Artist in Painting in 1973 after Fernando
Amorsolo. Among of his awards are first prize for his
work "Kaingin" at the annual Art Association of the
Philippines, "Most Outstanding Alumnus" in 1959, and
Republic Cultural Heritage Award in 1964.
Victorio C. Edades
(December 23, 1895 – March 7, 1985)
Painting distorted human figures in rough, bold

impasto strokes, and standing tall and singular in
his advocacy and practice of what he believes is
creative art, Victorio C. Edades emerged as the
“Father of Modern Philippine Painting”. Unlike,
Amorsolo’s bright, sunny, cheerful hues, Edades’
colors were dark and somber with subject matter or
themes depicting laborers, factory workers or the
simple folk in all their dirt, sweat and grime. In
the 1930s, Edades taught at the University of Santos
Tomas and became dean of its Department of
Architecture where he stayed for three full decades.
It was during this time that he introduced a liberal
arts program that offers subjects as art history and
foreign languages that will lead to a Bachelor’s
degree in Fine Arts. This development brought about a
first in Philippine education since art schools then
were vocational schools.
It was also the time that Edades invited Carlos

“Botong” Francisco and Galo B. Ocampo to become
professor artists for the university. The three, who
would later be known as the formidable “Triumvirate”,
led the growth of mural painting in the country.
Finally retiring from teaching at age 70, the
university conferred on Edades the degree of Doctor
of Fine Arts, honoris causa, for being an outstanding
“visionary, teacher and artist.”
Among his works are The Sketch, The Artist and the
Model, Portrait of the Professor, Japanese
Girl, Mother and Daughter, The Wrestlers,
and Poinsettia Girl.
Vicente Manansala
(January 22, 1910 – August 22, 1981)
Vicente Manansala‘s paintings are described as

visions of reality teetering on the edge of
abstraction. As a young boy, his talent was revealed
through the copies he made of the Sagrada Familia and
his mother’s portrait that he copied from a
photograph. After finishing the fine arts course from
the University of the Philippines, he ran away from
home and later found himself at the Philippines
Herald as an illustrator. It was there that Manansala
developed close association with Hernando R. Ocampo,
Cesar Legaspi, and Carlos Botong Francisco, the
latter being the first he admired most. For
Manansala, Botong was a master of the human figure.
Among the masters, Manansala professes a preference
for Cezanne and Picasso whom he says have achieved a
balance of skill and artistry.
He trained at Paris and at Otis School of Drawing in

Los Angeles. Manansala believes that the beauty of
art is in the process, in the moment of doing a
particular painting, closely associating it with the
act of making love. “The climax is just when it’s
really finished.”
Manansala’s works include A Cluster of Nipa Hut, San
Francisco Del Monte,Banaklaot, I Believe in
God,Market Venders, Madonna of the Slums, Still Life
with Green Guitar, Via Crucis, Whirr, Nude.
Jeremias Elizalde Navarro

(May 22, 1924 – June 10, 1999)
J. (Jeremias) Elizalde Navarro, was born on May 22,

1924 in Antique. He is a versatile artist, being both
a proficient painter and sculptor. His devotion to
the visual arts spans 40 years of drawing,
printmaking, graphic designing, painting and
sculpting. His masks carved in hardwood merge the
human and the animal; his paintings consists of
abstracts and figures in oil and watercolor; and his
assemblages fuse found objects and metal parts. He
has done a series of figurative works drawing
inspiration from Balinese art and culture, his power
as a master of colors largely evident in his large
four-panel The Seasons (1992: Prudential Bank
collection).
A Navarro sampler includes his ’50s and ’60s fiction

illustrations for This Week of the Manila Chronicle,
and the rotund, India-ink figurative drawings for
Lydia Arguilla’s storybook, Juan Tamad. Three of his
major mixed media works are I’m Sorry Jesus, I Can’t
Attend Christmas This Year (1965), and his Homage to
Dodjie Laurel (1969: Ateneo Art Gallery collection),
and A Flying Contraption for Mr. Icarus (1984: Lopez
Museum).
Jose Joya
National Artist for Visual Arts (2003)
(June 3, 1931 – May 11, 1995)
Jose Joya is a painter and multimedia artist who
distinguished himself by creating an authentic
Filipino abstract idiom that transcended foreign
influences. Most of Joya’s paintings of harmonious
colors were inspired by Philippine landscapes, such
as green rice paddies and golden fields of harvest.
His use of rice paper in collages placed value on
transparency, a common characteristic of folk art.
The curvilinear forms of his paintings often recall
the colorful and multilayered ‘kiping’ of the Pahiyas
festival. His important mandala series was also drawn
from Asian aesthetic forms and concepts.
He espoused the value of kinetic energy and

spontaneity in painting which became significant
artistic values in Philippine art. His paintings
clearly show his mastery of ‘gestural paintings’
where paint is applied intuitively and spontaneously,
in broad brush strokes, using brushes or spatula or
is directly squeezed from the tube and splashed
across the canvas. His 1958 landmark
painting Granadean Arabesque,a work on canvas big
enough to be called a mural, features swipes and gobs
of impasto and sand. The choice of Joya to represent
the Philippines in the 1964 Venice Biennial itself
represents a high peak in the rise of the modern art
in the country.
Joya also led the way for younger artists in bringing

out the potentials of multimedia. He designed and
painted on ceramic vessels, plates and tiles, and
stimulated regional workshops. He also did work in
the graphic arts, particularly in printmaking.
His legacy is undeniably a large body of work of

consistent excellence which has won the admiration of
artists both in the local and international scene.
Among them are his compositions Beethoven Listening
to the Blues, andSpace Transfiguration, and other
works like Hills of Nikko, Abstraction, Dimension of
Fear, Naiad, Torogan,Cityscape.
VISUAL
Cesar Legaspi
(April 2, 1917 – April 7, 1994)
A pioneer “Neo-Realist” of the country, Cesar

Legaspi is remembered for his singular achievement of
refining cubism in the Philippine context. Legaspi
belonged to the so-called “Thirteen Moderns” and
later, the “Neo-realists”. His distinctive style and
daring themes contributed significantly to the advent
and eventual acceptance of modern art in the
Philippines. Legaspi made use of the geometric
fragmentation technique, weaving social comment and
juxtaposing the mythical and modern into his
overlapping, interacting forms with disturbing power
and intensity.
Among his works are Gadgets I, Gadgets

II, Diggers, Idols of the Third
Eye, Facade, Ovary, Flora and
Fauna,Triptych, Flight, Bayanihan, Struggle,Avenging
Figure, Turning Point, Peace, The Survivor, The
Ritual.
Hernando R. Ocampo
(April 28, 1911 – December 28, 1978)
Hernando R. Ocampo, a self-taught painter, was a

leading member of the pre-war Thirteen Moderns, the
group that charted the course of modern art in the
Philippines. His works provided an understanding and
awareness of the harsh social realities in the
country immediately after the Second World War and
contributed significantly to the rise of the
nationalist spirit in the post-war era. It was,
however, his abstract works that left an indelible
mark on Philippine modern art. His canvases evoked
the lush Philippine landscape, its flora and fauna,
under the sun and rain in fierce and bold colors. He
also played a pivotal role in sustaining the
Philippine Art Gallery, the country’s first.
Ocampo’s acknowledged masterpiece Genesis served as

the basis of the curtain design of the Cultural
Center of the Philippines Main Theater. His other
major works include Ina ng Balon, Calvary, Slum
Dwellers, Nude with Candle and Flower, Man and
Carabao, Angel’s Kiss, Palayok at
Kalan, Ancestors,Isda at Mangga, The
Resurrection, Fifty-three “Q”, Backdrop, Fiesta.
Arturo Luz
November 20, 1926
Arturo Luz, painter, sculptor, and designer for more

than 40 years, created masterpieces that exemplify an
ideal of sublime austerity in expression and form.
From the Carnival series of the late 1950s to the
recent Cyclist paintings, Luz produced works that
elevated Filipino aesthetic vision to new heights of
sophisticated simplicity. By establishing the Luz
Gallery that professionalized the art gallery as an
institution and set a prestigious influence over
generations of Filipino artists, Luz inspired and
developed a Filipino artistic community that nurtures
impeccable designs.
Among his other significant paintings are Bagong
Taon, Vendador de Flores, Skipping Rope, Candle
Vendors,Procession, Self-Portrait, Night Glows,Grand
Finale, Cities of the Past, Imaginary Landscapes. His
mural painting Black and White is displayed in the
lobby of the CCP’s Bulwagang Carlos V. Francisco
(Little Theater). His sculpture of a stainless steel
cube is located in front of the Benguet Mining
Corporation Building in Pasig.
Ang Kiukok
(March 1, 1931 – May 9, 2005)
Born to immigrant Chinese parents Vicente Ang and

Chin Lim, Ang Kiukok is one of the most vital and
dynamic figures who emerged during the 60s.. As one
of those who came at the heels of the pioneering
modernists during that decade, Ang Kiukok blazed a
formal and iconographic path of his own through
expressionistic works of high visual impact and
compelling meaning.
He crystallized in vivid, cubistic figures the terror

and angst of the times. Shaped in the furnace of the
political turmoil of those times, Ang Kiukok pursued
an expression imbued with nationalist fervor and
sociological agenda.
Some of his works include: Geometric

Landscape (1969); Pieta, which won for him the bronze
medal in the 1st International Art Exhibition held in
Saigon (1962); and the Seated Figure (1979),
auctioned at Sotheby’s in Singapore.
His works can be found in many major art collections,

among them the Cultural Center of the Philippines,
National Historical Museum of Taipei, and the
National Museum in Singapore.
Benedicto R. Cabrera
(April 10, 1942)
Benedicto R. Cabrera, *who signs his paintings

“Bencab,” upheld the primacy of drawing over the
decorative color. Bencab started his career in the
mid-sixties as a lyrical expressionist. His solitary
figures of scavengers emerging from a dark landscape
were piercing stabs at the social conscience of a
people long inured to poverty and dereliction.
Bencab, who was born in Malabon, has christened the
emblematic scavenger figure “Sabel.” For Bencab,
Sabel is a melancholic symbol of dislocation, despair
and isolation–the personification of human dignity
threatened by life’s vicissitudes, and the vast
inequities of Philippine society.
Bencab’s exploration of form, finding his way out of

the late neo-realism and high abstraction of the
sixties to be able to reconsider the potency of
figurative expression had held out vital options for
Philippine art in the Martial Law years in the
seventies through the contemporary era.
Selected works:
Madonna with Objects, 1991

Studies of Sabel, dyptych, 1991
People Waiting, 1989
The Indifference, 1988
Waiting for the Monsoon, 1986
Abdulmari Asia Imao

(January 14, 1936 – December 16, 2014)
Abdulmari Asia Imao, a native of Sulu, is a sculptor,
painter, photographer, ceramist, documentary film
maker, cultural researcher, writer, and articulator
of Philippine Muslim art and culture.
Through his works, the indigenous ukkil, sarimanok

and naga motifs have been popularized and instilled
in the consciousness of the Filipino nation and other
peoples as original Filipino creations.
His U.P. art education introduced him to Filipino

masters like Guillermo Tolentino and Napoleon Abueva,
who were among his mentors.
With his large-scale sculptures and monuments of

Muslim and regional heroes and leaders gracing
selected sites from Batanes to Tawi-tawi, Imao has
helped develop among cultural groups trust and
confidence necessary for the building of a more just
and humane society.
Selected works:
Industry Brass Mural, Philippine National Bank, San

Fernando, La Union
Mural Relief on Filmmaking, Manila City Hall
Industrial Mural, Central Bank of the Philippines,
San Fernando, La Union
Sulu Warriors (statues of Panglima Unaid and Captain
Abdurahim Imao), 6 ft., Sulu Provincial Capitol
Federico Aguilar y Alcuaz

(June 6, 1932 – February 2, 2011)
Federico Aguilar y Alcuaz, who signed his works as

Aguilar Alcuaz was an artist of voluminous output. He
is known mainly for his gestural paintings in acrylic
and oil, as well as sketches in ink, watercolor and
pencil. He was also a sculptor of note and has
rendered abstract and figurative works in ceramics,
tapestries and even in relief sculptures made of
paper and mixed media, which he simply calls
“Alcuazaics.” The preference to use his maternal name
was more for practical reasons; Alcuaz was rarer than
the name Aguilar, and thus ensured better recall; it
was also simpler to drop the customary y between the
two names.
Alcuaz belongs to the second generation of Filipino

modernists after the fabled Thirteen Moderns,
credited along with Jose Joya, Constancio Bernardo,
Fernando Zobel and Arturo Luz, for building a
significant body of abstract art from the arguably
more tentative efforts of their predecessors. Alcuaz
went to the UP College of Fine Arts in Diliman while
also taking up his pre-law course at San Beda
College. Napoleon Abueva, Jose Joya and Juvenal Sanso
were also in school with him at that time, studying
under Fernando Amorsolo, Guillermo Tolentino, Irineo
Miranda, Constancio Bernardo and Toribio Herrera. He
would go on to win prizes at UP and at the national
Shell Art competition, and embarked on several solo
exhibits after graduating from San Beda
Alcuaz would go on in 1955 to obtain a law degree at

the Ateneo de Manila in Padre Faura, Manila in
deference to his father’s wishes, but after mounting
an exhibit at the legendary Philippine Art Gallery,
he received a fellowship from the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs in Spain and proceeded to study at the
Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Madrid,
where other Filipino expatriates like Juan Luna,
Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo, Fernando Amorsolo, Fabian
dela Rosa and Jose Ma. Asuncion received a similar
classical training.
After his studies, he stayed on to live and

familiarize himself with the art and culture of
Europe. He had exhibits in Madrid and then in
Barcelona, where he met his future wife Ute Schmidt
who he married in 1959. They have three children. In
1964, the family moved to Manila, but after 4 years
his wife returned to Germany with their three sons,
whereupon, Alcuaz embarked once more on shuttling
between Europe to see his family and mount exhibits,
and then to Manila, where he preferred to do his
studio at the Manila Hilton (now the Manila
Pavilion).
His works are highly favored, not only for its

studied refinement and European flair, but also for
the ease and pleasure conveyed by his choice of
light, color and composition; all of which add up to
scenes which are always quite playful but never
cluttered. His love for classical music is also
apparent in this constant fluidity.
Francisco Coching
(January 29, 1919 – September 1, 1998)
Francisco Coching, acknowledged as the “Dean of

Filipino Illustrators” and son of noted Tagalog
novelist and comics illustrator Gregorio Coching, was
a master storyteller – in images and in print. His
illustrations and novels were products of that happy
combination of fertile imagination, a love of
storytelling, and fine draftsmanship. He synthesized
images and stories informing Philippine folk and
popular imagination of culture. His career spanned
four decades.
Starting his career in 1934, he was a central force

in the formation of the popular art form of comics.
He was a part of the golden age of the Filipino
comics in the 50’s and 60’s. Until his early
retirement in 1973, Coching mesmerized the comics-
reading public as well as his fellow artists,
cartoonists and writers.
The source of his imagery can be traced to the

Philippine culture from the 19th century to the
1960s. His works reflected the dynamics brought about
by the racial and class conflict in Philippine
colonial society in the 19th century, a theme that
continued to be dealt with for a long time in
Philippine cinema. He valorized the indigenous,
untrammeled Filipino in Lapu-Lapu and Sagisag ng
Lahing Pilipino, and created the types that affirm
the native sense of self in his Malay heroes of
stunning physique. His women are beautiful and
gentle, but at the same time can be warrior-like, as
in Marabini (Marahas na Binibini) or the strong
seductive, modern women of his comics in the 50s and
60s.
There is myth and fantasy, too, featuring the

grotesque characters, vampire bats, shriveled
witches, as in Haring Ulopong. Yet, Coching grounded
his works too in the experience of war during the
Japanese occupation, he was a guerilla of the
Kamagong Unit, Las Pinas branch of the ROTC hunters
in the Philippines. He also drew from the popular
post-war culture of the 50s, as seen in Movie Fan. At
this point, his settings and characters became more
urbane, and the narratives he weaved scanned the
changing times and mores, as
in Pusakal, Talipandas, Gigolo, and Maldita.
In his characters and storylines, Coching brings to

popular consciousness the issues concerning race and
identity. He also discussed in his works the concept
of the hero, which resonate through the characters on
his comics like inDimasalang and El Vibora.
He also left a lasting influence on the succeeding
generations of younger cartoonist such as Larry
Alcala, Ben Infante and Nestor Redondo. The comics as
popular art also helped forge the practice and
consciousness as a national language.
SCULPTURE
Guillermo Estrella Tolentino

National Artist for Sculpture (1973)
(July 24, 1890 – July 12, 1976)
Guillermo Estrella Tolentino is a product of the

Revival period in Philippine art. Returning from
Europe (where he was enrolled at the Royal Academy of
Fine Arts, Rome) in 1925, he was appointed as
professor at the UP School of Fine Arts where the
idea also of executing a monument for national heroes
struck him. The result was the UP Oblation that
became the symbol of freedom at the campus.
Acknowledged as his masterpiece and completed in
1933, The Bonifacio Monument in Caloocan stands as an
enduring symbol of the Filipinos’ cry for freedom.
Other works include the bronze figures of President

Quezon at Quezon Memorial, life-size busts of Jose
Rizal at UP and UE, marble statue of Ramon
Magsaysay in GSIS Building; granolithics of heroic
statues representing education, medicine, forestry,
veterinary science, fine arts and music at UP.
He also designed the gold and bronze medals for

the Ramon Magsaysay Award and did the seal of
the Republic of the Philippines.
Napoleon V. Abueva
National Artist for Sculpture (1976)
(born January 26, 1930)
At 46 then, Napoleon V. Abueva, a native of Bohol,

was the youngest National Artist awardee. Considered
as the Father of Modern Philippine Sculpture, Abueva
has helped shape the local sculpture scene to what it
is now. Being adept in either academic
representational style or modern abstract, he has
utilized almost all kinds of materials from hard wood
(molave, acacia, langka wood, ipil, kamagong, palm
wood and bamboo) to adobe, metal, stainless steel,
cement, marble, bronze, iron, alabaster, coral and
brass. Among the early innovations Abueva introduced
in 1951 was what he referred to as “buoyant
sculpture” — sculpture meant to be appreciated from
the surface of a placid pool. In the 80’s, Abueva put
up a one-man show at the Philippine Center, New York.
His works have been installed in different museums
here and abroad, such as The Sculpture at the United
Nations headquarters in New York City.
Some of his major works

include Kaganapan (1953), Kiss of Judas (1955),Thirty
Pieces of Silver, The Transfiguration (1979), Eternal
Garden Memorial Park, UP Gateway (1967), Nine
Muses (1994), UP Faculty Center, Sunburst (1994)-
Peninsula Manila Hotel, the bronze figure of Teodoro
M. Kalaw in front of National Library, and murals in
marble at the National Heroes Shrine, Mt. Samat,
Bataan.
DANCE
Francisca Reyes Aquino
National Artist for Dance (1973)
(March 9, 1899 – November 21, 1983)
Francisca Reyes Aquino is acknowledged as the Folk

Dance Pioneer. This Bulakeña began her research on
folk dances in the 1920’s making trips to remote
barrios in Central and Northern Luzon. Her research
on the unrecorded forms of local celebration, ritual
and sport resulted into a 1926 thesis titled
“Philippine Folk Dances and Games,” and arranged
specifically for use by teachers and playground
instructors in public and private schools. In the
1940’s, she served as supervisor of physical
education at the Bureau of Education that distributed
her work and adapted the teaching of folk dancing as
a medium of making young Filipinos aware of their
cultural heritage. In 1954, she received the Republic
Award of Merit given by the late Pres. Ramon
Magsaysay for “outstanding contribution toward the
advancement of Filipino culture”, one among the many
awards and recognition given to her.
Her books include the following: Philippine National

Dances (1946); Gymnastics for
Girls (1947); Fundamental Dance Steps and
Music (1948);Foreign Folk Dances (1949); Dances for
all Occasion (1950); Playground Demonstration (1951);
and Philippine Folk Dances, Volumes I to VI.
Leonor Orosa Goquingco

National Artist for Dance
(July 24, 1917 – July 15, 2005)
Dubbed the “Trailblazer”, “Mother of Philippine

Theater Dance” and “Dean of Filipino Performing Arts
Critics”,Leonor Orosa Goquingco, pioneer Filipino
choreographer in balletic folkloric and Asian styles,
has produced for over 50 years highly original,
first-of-a-kind choreographies, mostly to her own
storylines. These include “TREND: Return to Native,”
“In a Javanese Garden,” “Sports,” “VINTA!,” “In a
Concentration Camp,” “The Magic Garden,” “The
Clowns,” “Firebird,” “Noli Dance Suite,” “The
Flagellant,” “The Creation…” Seen as her most
ambitious work is the dance epic “Filipinescas:
Philippine Life, Legend and Lore.” With it, Orosa has
brought native folk dance, mirroring Philippine
culture from pagan to modern times, to its highest
stage of development.
She was the Honorary Chair of the Association of

Ballet Academies of the Philippines (ABAP), and was a
founding member of the Philippine Ballet Theater.
Lucrecia Reyes-Urtula
(June 29, 1929 – August 24, 1999)
Lucrecia Reyes-Urtula, choreographer, dance educator

and researcher, spent almost four decades in the
discovery and study of Philippine folk and ethnic
dances. She applied her findings to project a new
example of an ethnic dance culture that goes beyond
simple preservation and into creative growth. Over a
period of thirty years, she had choreographed suites
of mountain dances, Spanish-influenced dances, Muslim
pageants and festivals, regional variations and
dances of the countryside for the Bayanihan
Philippine Dance Company of which she is the dance
director. These dances have all earned critical
acclaim and rave reviews from audiences in their
world tours in Americas, Europe, Asia, Australia and
Africa.
Among the widely acclaimed dances she had staged were
the following: Singkil, a Bayanihan signature number
based on a Maranao epic poem; Vinta, a dance honoring
Filipino sailing prowess; Tagabili, a tale of tribal
conflict;Pagdiwata, a four-day harvest festival
condensed into a six-minute breath-taking
spectacle; Salidsid, a mountain wedding dance ; Idaw,
Banga and Aires de Verbena.
Ramon Obusan
(June 16, 1938 – December 21, 2006)
Ramon Obusan was a *dancer, choreographer, stage

designer and artistic director. He achieved
phenomenal success in Philippine dance and cultural
work. He was also cknowledged as a researcher,
archivist and documentary filmmaker who broadened and
deepened the Filipino understanding of his own
cultural life and expressions. Through the Ramon
Obusan Folkloric Grop (ROFG), he had effected
cultural and diplomatic exchanges using the
multifarious aspects and dimensions of the art of
dance.
Among the full-length productions he choreographed

are the following:
“Vamos a Belen! Series” (1998-2004) Philippine Dances

Tradition
“Noon Po sa Amin,” tableaux of Philippine History in
song, drama and dance
“Obra Maestra,” a collection of Ramon Obusan’s dance
masterpieces
“Unpublished Dances of the Philippines,” Series I-IV
“Water, Fire and Life, Philippine Dances and Music–A
Celebration of Life
Saludo sa Sentenyal”
“Glimpses of ASEAN, Dances and Music of the ASEAN-
Member Countries”
“Saplot (Ramon Obusan Folkloric Group): Philippines
Costumes in Dance”
Alice Reyes
( October 14, 1942)
The name Alice Reyes has become a significant part of

Philippine dance parlance. As a dancer,
choreographer, teacher and director, she has made a
lasting impact on the development and promotion of
contemporary dance in the Philippines. Her dance
legacy is evident in the dance companies, teachers,
choreographers and the exciting Filipino modern dance
repertoire of our country today.
Reyes’ dance training started at an early age with

classical ballet under the tutelage of Rosalia Merino
Santos. She subsequently trained in folk dance under
the Bayanihan Philippine National Dance Company and
pursued modern dance and jazz education and training
in the United States. Since then, during a
professional dance career that spanned over two
decades, her innovative artistic vision, firm
leadership and passion for dance have made a lasting
mark on Philippine dance.
Perhaps the biggest contribution of Alice Reyes to

Philippine dance is the development of a distinctly
Filipino modern dance idiom. Utilizing inherently
Filipino materials and subject matters expressed
through a combination of movements and styles from
Philippine indigenous dance, modern dance and
classical ballet she has successfully created a
contemporary dance language that is uniquely
Filipino. From her early masterpiece Amada to the
modern dance classic Itim-Asu, to her last major
work Bayanihan Remembered which she staged for Ballet
Philippines, she utilized this idiom to promote
unique facets of Philippine arts, culture and
heritage.
By introducing the first modern dance concert at the

CCP Main Theater in February 1970 featuring an all
contemporary dance repertoire and by promoting it
successfully to a wide audience, she initiated the
popularization of modern dance in the country. She
followed this up by programs that developed modern
dancers, teachers, choreographers and audiences. By
organizing outreach tours to many provinces, lecture-
demonstrations in schools, television promotions, a
subscription season and children’s matinee series,
she slowly helped build an audience base for Ballet
Philippines and modern dance in the country.
Among her major works: Amada (1969), At a Maranaw

Gathering (1970) Itim-Asu (1971), Tales of the
Manuvu(1977), Rama Hari (1980), Bayanihan Remembered
(1987).
LITERATURE
Amado V. Hernandez
National Artist for Literature (1973)
(September 13, 1903 – May 24, 1970)
Amado V. Hernandez, poet, playwright, and novelist,

is among the Filipino writers who practiced
“committed art”. In his view, the function of the
writer is to act as the conscience of society and to
affirm the greatness of the human spirit in the face
of inequity and oppression. Hernandez’s contribution
to the development of Tagalog prose is considerable —
he stripped Tagalog of its ornate character and wrote
in prose closer to the colloquial than the “official”
style permitted. His novel Mga Ibong Mandaragit,
first written by Hernandez while in prison, is the
first Filipino socio-political novel that exposes the
ills of the society as evident in the agrarian
problems of the 50s.
Hernandez’s other works include Bayang Malaya, Isang

Dipang Langit, Luha ng Buwaya, Amado V. Hernandez:
Tudla at Tudling: Katipunan ng mga Nalathalang Tula
1921-1970, Langaw sa Isang Basong Gatas at Iba Pang
Kuwento ni Amado V. Hernandez, Magkabilang Mukha ng
Isang Bagol at Iba Pang Akda ni Amado V. Hernandez.
Jose Garcia Villa

(August 5, 1908 – July 7, 1997)
“Art is a miraculous flirtation with Nothing!

Aiming for nothing, and landing on the Sun.”
― Doveglion: Collected Poems
Jose Garcia Villa is considered as one of the finest

contemporary poets regardless of race or language.
Villa, who lived in Singalong, Manila, introduced the
reversed consonance rime scheme, including the comma
poems that made full use of the punctuation mark in
an innovative, poetic way. The first of his poems
“Have Come, Am Here” received critical recognition
when it appeared in New York in 1942 that, soon
enough, honors and fellowships were heaped on him:
Guggenheim, Bollingen, the American Academy of Arts
and Letters Awards. He used Doveglion (Dove, Eagle,
Lion) as penname, the very characters he attributed
to himself, and the same ones explored by e.e.
cummings in the poem he wrote for Villa (Doveglion,
Adventures in Value). Villa is also known for the
tartness of his tongue.
Villa’s works have been collected into the following
books: Footnote to Youth,Many Voices, Poems by
Doveglion,Poems 55, Poems in Praise of Love: The Best
Love Poems of Jose Garcia Villa as Chosen By
Himself,Selected Stories,The Portable Villa, The
Essential Villa, Mir-i-nisa, Storymasters 3: Selected
Stories from Footnote to Youth, 55 Poems: Selected
and Translated into Tagalog by Hilario S. Francia.
Nick Joaquin
(May 4, 1917 – April 29, 2004)
“Before 1521 we could have been anything and

everything not Filipino; after 1565 we can be nothing
but Filipino.” ―Culture and History, 1988
Nick Joaquin, is regarded by many as the most

distinguished Filipino writer in English writing so
variedly and so well about so many aspects of the
Filipino. Nick Joaquin has also enriched the English
language with critics coining “Joaquinesque” to
describe his baroque Spanish-flavored English or his
reinventions of English based on Filipinisms. Aside
from his handling of language, Bienvenido Lumbera
writes that Nick Joaquin’s significance in Philippine
literature involves his exploration of the Philippine
colonial past under Spain and his probing into the
psychology of social changes as seen by the young, as
exemplified in stories such as Doña
Jeronima, Candido’s Apocalypse and The Order of
Melchizedek. Nick Joaquin has written plays, novels,
poems, short stories and essays including reportage
and journalism. As a journalist, Nick Joaquin uses
the nome de guerre Quijano de Manila but whether he
is writing literature or journalism, fellow National
Artist Francisco Arcellana opines that “it is always
of the highest skill and quality”.
Among his voluminous works are The Woman Who Had Two
Navels, A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino, Manila,
My Manila: A History for the Young, The Ballad of the
Five Battles, Rizal in Saga, Almanac for Manileños,
Cave and Shadows.
Carlos P. Romulo
Carlos P. Romulo‘s multifaceted career spanned 50

years of public service as educator, soldier,
university president, journalist and diplomat. It is
common knowledge that he was the first Asian
president of the United Nations General Assembly,
then Philippine Ambassador to Washington, D.C., and
later minister of foreign affairs. Essentially
though, Romulo was very much into writing: he was a
reporter at 16, a newspaper editor by the age of 20,
and a publisher at 32. He was the only Asian to win
America’s coveted Pulitzer Prize in Journalism for a
series of articles predicting the outbreak of World
War II. Romulo, in all, wrote and published 18 books,
a range of literary works which included The
United (novel), I Walked with
Heroes (autobiography), I Saw the Fall of the
Philippines, Mother America, I See the Philippines
Rise (war-time memoirs).
His other books include his memoirs of his many

years’ affiliations with United Nations (UN), Forty
Years: A Third World Soldier at the UN, and The
Philippine Presidents, his oral history of his
experiences serving all the Philippine presidents.
Francisco Arcellana
(September 6, 1916 – August 1, 2002)
Francisco Arcellana, writer, poet, essayist, critic,

journalist and teacher, is one of the most important
progenitors of the modern Filipino short story in
English. He pioneered the development of the short
story as a lyrical prose-poetic form. For Arcellana,
the pride of fiction is “that it is able to render
truth, that is able to present reality”. Arcellana
kept alive the experimental tradition in fiction, and
had been most daring in exploring new literary forms
to express the sensibility of the Filipino people. A
brilliant craftsman, his works are now an
indispensable part of a tertiary-level-syllabi all
over the country. Arcellana’s published books
are Selected Stories (1962), Poetry and Politics: The
State of Original Writing in English in the
Philippines Today (1977), The Francisco Arcellana
Sampler(1990).
“The names which were with infinite slowness

revealed, seemed strange and stranger still; the
colors not bright but deathly dull; the separate
letters spelling out the names of the dead among
them, did not seem to glow or shine with a festive
sheen as did the other living names.”
(from “The Mats”, Philippine Contemporary

Literature, 1963)
Some of his short stories are Frankie, The Man Who

Would Be Poe, Death in a Factory, Lina, A Clown
Remembers, Divided by Two, The Mats, and his poems
being The Other Woman, This Being the Third Poem This
Poem is for Mathilda, To Touch You and I Touched Her,
among others.
N.V.M Gonzalez
(September 8, 1915 – November 28, 1999)
Nestor Vicente Madali Gonzalez, better known as

N.V.M. Gonzalez, fictionist, essayist, poet, and
teacher, articulated the Filipino spirit in rural,
urban landscapes. Among the many recognitions, he won
the First Commonwealth Literary Contest in 1940,
received the Republic Cultural Heritage Award in 1960
and the Gawad CCP Para sa Sining in 1990. The awards
attest to his triumph in appropriating the English
language to express, reflect and shape Philippine
culture and Philippine sensibility. He became U.P.’s
International-Writer-In-Residence and a member of the
Board of Advisers of the U.P. Creative Writing
Center. In 1987, U.P. conferred on him the Doctor of
Humane Letters, honoris causa, its highest academic
recognition.
Major works of N.V.M Gonzalez include the

following: The Winds of April, Seven Hills Away,
Children of the Ash-Covered Loam and Other Stories,
The Bamboo Dancers, Look Stranger, on this Island
Now, Mindoro and Beyond: Twenty -One Stories, The
Bread of Salt and Other Stories, Work on the
Mountain, The Novel of Justice: Selected Essays 1968-
1994, A Grammar of Dreams and Other Stories.
Carlos Quirino
National Artist for Historical Literature (1997)
(January 14, 1910 – May 20, 1999)
Carlos Quirino, biographer, has the distinction of

having written one of the earliest biographies of
Jose Rizal titled The Great Malayan. Quirino’s books
and articles span the whole gamut of Philippine
history and culture–from Bonifacio’s trial to
Aguinaldo’s biography, from Philippine cartography to
culinary arts, from cash crops to tycoons and
president’s lives, among so many subjects. In 1997,
Pres. Fidel Ramos created historical literature as a
new category in the National Artist Awards and
Quirino was its first recipient. He made a record
earlier on when he became the very first Filipino
correspondent for the United Press Institute.
His book Maps and Views of Old Manila is considered

as the best book on the subject. His other books
includeQuezon, Man of Destiny, Magsaysay of the
Philippines, Lives of the Philippine
Presidents, Philippine Cartography, The History of
Philippine Sugar Industry, Filipino Heritage: The
Making of a Nation, Filipinos at War: The Fight for
Freedom from Mactan to EDSA.
Edith L. Tiempo
(April 22, 1919 – August 21, 2011)
Edith L. Tiempo, poet, fictionist, teacher and

literary critic is one of the finest Filipino writers
in English whose works are characterized by a
remarkable fusion of style and substance, of
craftsmanship and insight. Born on April 22, 1919 in
Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya, her poems are intricate
verbal transfigurations of significant experiences as
revealed, in two of her much anthologized pieces,
“The Little Marmoset” and “Bonsai”. As fictionist,
Tiempo is as morally profound. Her language has been
marked as “descriptive but unburdened by scrupulous
detailing.” She is an influential tradition in
Philippine literature in English. Together with her
late husband, Edilberto K. Tiempo, she founded and
directed the Silliman National Writers Workshop in
Dumaguete City, which has produced some of the
country’s best writers.
F. Sionil Jose
(born 3 December 1924)
F. Sionil Jose’s writings since the late 60s, when

taken collectively can best be described as epic. Its
sheer volume puts him on the forefront of Philippine
writing in English. But ultimately, it is the
consistent espousal of the aspirations of the
Filipino–for national sovereignty and social justice–
that guarantees the value of his oeuvre.
In the five-novel masterpiece, the Rosales saga,

consisting of The Pretenders, Tree, My Brother, My
Executioner, Mass, and Po-on, he captures the sweep
of Philippine history while simultaneously narrating
the lives of generations of the Samsons whose
personal lives intertwine with the social struggles
of the nation. Because of their international appeal,
his works, including his many short stories, have
been published and translated into various languages.
F. Sionil Jose is also a publisher, lecturer on

cultural issues, and the founder of the Philippine
chapter of the international organization PEN. He was
bestowed the CCP Centennial Honors for the Arts in
1999; the Outstanding Fulbrighters Award for
Literature in 1988; and the Ramon Magsaysay Award for
Journalism, Literature, and Creative Communication
Arts in 1980.
Virgilio S. Almario
(born March 9, 1944)
Virgilio S. Almario, also known as Rio Alma, is a
poet, literary historian and critic, who has revived
and reinvented traditional Filipino poetic forms,
even as he championed modernist poetics. In 34 years,
he has published 12 books of poetry, which include
the seminal Makinasyon and Peregrinasyon, and the
landmark trilogy Doktrinang Anakpawis, Mga Retrato at
Rekwerdo and Muli, Sa Kandungan ng Lupa. In these
works, his poetic voice soared from the lyrical to
the satirical to the epic, from the dramatic to the
incantatory, in his often severe examination of the
self, and the society.
He has also redefined how the Filipino poetry is

viewed and paved the way for the discussion of the
same in his 10 books of criticisms and anthologies,
among which are Ang Makata sa Panahon ng
Makina, Balagtasismo versus Modernismo,Walong Dekada
ng Makabagong Tula Pilipino, Mutyang
Dilim and Barlaan at Josaphat.
Many Filipino writers have come under his wing in the

literary workshops he founded –the Galian sa Arte at
Tula (GAT) and the Linangan sa Imahen, Retorika at
Anyo (LIRA). He has also long been involved with
children’s literature through the Aklat Adarna
series, published by his Children’s Communication
Center. He has been a constant presence as well in
national writing workshops and galvanizes member
writers as chairman emeritus of the Unyon ng mga
Manunulat sa Pilipinas (UMPIL).
He headed the National Commission for Culture and the

Arts as Executive Director, (from 1998 to 2001) ably
steering the Commission towards its goals.
But more than anything else, what Almario

accomplished was that he put a face to the Filipino
writer in the country, one strong face determinedly
wielding a pen into untruths, hypocrisy, injustice,
among others.
Alejandro Roces
(July 13, 1924 – May 23, 2011)
“You cannot be a great writer; first, you have to be

a good person”
Alejandro Roces, is a short story writer and

essayist, and considered as the country’s best writer
of comic short stories. He is known for his widely
anthologized “My Brother’s Peculiar Chicken.” In his
innumerable newspaper columns, he has always focused
on the neglected aspects of the Filipino cultural
heritage. His works have been published in various
international magazines and has received national and
international awards.
Ever the champion of Filipino cultures, Roces brought

to public attention the aesthetics of the country’s
fiestas. He was instrumental in popularizing several
local fiestas, notably, Moriones and Ati-atihan. He
personally led the campaign to change the country’s
Independence Day from July 4 to June 12, and caused
the change of language from English to Filipino in
the country’s stamps, currency and passports, and
recovered Jose Rizal’s manuscripts when they were
stolen from the National Archives.
His unflinching love of country led him to become a

guerilla during the Second World War, to defy martial
law and to found the major opposition party under the
dictatorship. His works have been published in
various international magazines and received numerous
national and international awards, including several
decorations from various governments.
Bienvenido Lumbera
Literature (2006)
(April 11, 1932)
Bienvenido Lumbera, is a poet, librettist, and

scholar.
*As a poet, he introduced to Tagalog literature what
is now known as Bagay poetry, a landmark aesthetic
tendency that has helped to change the vernacular
poetic tradition. He is the author of the following
works: Likhang Dila,Likhang Diwa (poems in Filipino
and English), 1993; Balaybay, Mga Tulang Lunot at
Manibalang, 2002; Sa Sariling Bayan, Apat na Dulang
May Musika, 2004; “Agunyas sa Hacienda
Luisita,” Pakikiramay, 2004.
As a librettist for the Tales of the Manuvu and Rama

Hari, he pioneered the creative fusion of fine arts
and popular imagination. As a scholar, his major
books include the following: Tagalog Poetry, 1570-
1898: Tradition and Influences in its Development;
Philippine Literature: A History and Anthology,
Revaluation: Essays on Philippine Literature, Writing
the Nation/Pag-akda ng Bansa.
Lazaro A. Francisco
(February 22, 1898 – June 17, 1980)
Prize-winning writer Lazaro A. Francisco developed

the social realist tradition in Philippine fiction.
His eleven novels, now acknowledged classics of
Philippine literature, embodies the author’s
commitment to nationalism. Amadis Ma. Guerrero wrote,
“Francisco championed the cause of the common man,
specifically the oppressed peasants. His novels
exposed the evils of the tenancy system, the
exploitation of farmers by unscrupulous landlords,
and foreign domination.” Teodoro Valencia also
observed, “His pen dignifies the Filipino and accents
all the positives about the Filipino way of life. His
writings have contributed much to the formation of a
Filipino nationalism.” Literary historian and critic
Bienvenido Lumbera also wrote, “When the history of
the Filipino novel is written, Francisco is likely to
occupy an eminent place in it. Already in Tagalog
literature, he ranks among the finest novelists since
the beginning of the 20th century. In addition to a
deft hand at characterization, Francisco has a supple
prose style responsive to the subtlest nuances of
ideas and the sternest stuff of passions.”
Francisco gained prominence as a writer not only for

his social conscience but also for his “masterful
handling of the Tagalog language” and “supple prose
style”. With his literary output in Tagalog, he
contributed to the enrichment of the Filipino
language and literature for which he is a staunch
advocate. He put up an arm to his advocacy of Tagalog
as a national language by establishing the Kapatiran
ng mga Alagad ng Wikang Pilipino (KAWIKA) in 1958.
His reputation as the “Master of the Tagalog Novel”

is backed up by numerous awards he received for his
meritorious novels in particular, and for his
contribution to Philippine literature and culture in
general. His masterpiece novels—Ama, Bayang
Nagpatiwakal, Maganda Pa Ang Daigdig and Daluyong—
affirm his eminent place in Philippine literature. In
1997, he was honored by the University of the
Philippines with a special convocation, where he was
cited as the “foremost Filipino novelist of his
generation” and “champion of the Filipino writer’s
struggle for national identity.”
Cirilo F. Bautista
(born July 9, 1941)
Cirilo F. Bautista is a poet, fictionist and essayist
with exceptional achievements and significant
contributions to the development of the country’s
literary arts. He is acknowledged by peers and
critics, and the nation at large as the foremost
writer of his generation.
Throughout his career that spans more than four

decades, he has established a reputation for fine and
profound artistry; his books, lectures, poetry
readings and creative writing workshops continue to
influence his peers and generations of young writers.
As a way of bringing poetry and fiction closer to the

people who otherwise would not have the opportunity
to develop their creative talent, Bautista has been
holding regular funded and unfunded workshops
throughout the country. In his campus lecture
circuits, Bautista has updated students and student-
writers on literary developments and techniques.
As a teacher of literature, Bautista has realized

that the classroom is an important training ground
for Filipino writers. In De La Salle University, he
was instrumental in the formation of the Bienvenido
Santos Creative Writing Center. He was also the
moving spirit behind the founding of the Philippine
Literary Arts Council in 1981, the Iligan National
Writers Workshop in 1993, and the Baguio Writers
Group.
Thus, Bautista continues to contribute to the

development of Philippine literature: as a writer,
through his significant body of works; as a teacher,
through his discovery and encouragement of young
writers in workshops and lectures; and as a critic,
through his essays that provide insights into the
craft of writing and correctives to misconceptions
about art.
Major works: Summer Suns (1963), Words and
Battlefields (1998), The Trilogy of Saint
Lazarus (2001), Galaw ng Asoge (2003).
MUSIC
Antonio J. Molina
National Artist for Music (1973)
(December 26, 1894 – January 29, 1980)
Antonio J. Molina, versatile musician, composer,

music educator was the last of the musical
triumvirate, two of whom were Nicanor Abelardo and
Francisco Santiago, who elevated music beyond the
realm of folk music. At an early age, he took to
playing the violoncello and played it so well it did
not take long before he was playing as orchestra
soloist for the Manila Grand Opera House. Molina is
credited for introducing such innovations as the
whole tone scale, pentatonic scale, exuberance of
dominant ninths and eleventh cords, and linear
counterpoints. As a member of the faculty of the UP
Conservatory, he had taught many of the country’s
leading musical personalities and educators like
Lucresia Kasilag and Felipe de Leon.
Molina’s most familiar composition is Hatinggabi, a

serenade for solo violin and piano accompaniment.
Other works are (orchestral music) Misa Antoniana
Grand Festival Mass, Ang Batingaw, Kundiman-
Kundangan; (chamber music) Hating Gabi, String
Quartet, Kung sa Iyong Gunita, Pandangguhan; (vocal
music) Amihan, Awit ni Maria Clara, Larawan Nitong
Pilipinas, among others.
Jovita Fuentes
(February 15, 1895 – August 7, 1978)
Long before Lea Salonga’s break into Broadway, there
was already Jovita Fuentes‘ portrayal of Cio-cio san
in Giacomo Puccini’s Madame Butterfly at Italy’s
Teatro Municipale di Piacenza. Her performance
was hailed as the “most sublime interpretation of the
part”. This is all the more significant because it
happened at a time when the Philippines and its
people were scarcely heard of in Europe. Prior to
that, she was teaching at the University of the
Philippines Conservatory of Music (1917) before
leaving for Milan in 1924 for further voice studies.
After eight months of arduous training, she made her
stage debut at the Piacenza. She later embarked on a
string of music performances in Europe essaying the
roles of Liu
Yu in Puccini’s Turnadot, Mimi in Puccini’s La
Boheme, Iris inPietro Mascagni’s Iris, the title role
of Salome (which composer Richard Strauss personally
offered to her including the special role of
Princess Yang Gui Fe in Li Tai Pe). In recognition of
these achievements, she was given the unprecedented
award of “Embahadora de Filipinas a su Madre Patria”
by Spain.
Her dream to develop the love for opera among her

countrymen led her to found the Artists’ Guild of the
Philippines, which was responsible for the periodic
“Tour of Operaland” productions. Her life story has
been documented in the biography Jovita Fuentes: A
Lifetime of Music (1978) written by Lilia H. Chung,
and later translated into Filipino by Virgilio
Almario.
Antonino R. Buenaventura
(May 4, 1904 – January 25, 1996)
Antonino R. Buenaventura vigorously pursued a musical

career that spanned seven decades of unwavering
commitment to advancing the frontiers of Philippine
music. In 1935, Buenaventura joined Francisca Reyes-
Aquino to conduct research on folksongs and dances
that led to its popularization. Buenaventura composed
songs, compositions, for solo instruments as well as
symphonic and orchestral works based on the folksongs
of various Philippine ethnic groups. He was also a
conductor and restored the Philippine Army Band to
its former prestige as one of the finest military
bands in the world making it “the only band that can
sound like a symphony orchestra”.
This once sickly boy who played the clarinet

proficiently has written several marches such as the
“Triumphal March,” “Echoes of the Past,” “History
Fantasy,” Second Symphony in E-flat, “Echoes from the
Philippines,” “Ode to Freedom.” His orchestral music
compositions include Concert Overture, Prelude and
Fugue in G Minor, Philippines Triumphant, Mindanao
Sketches, Symphony in C Major, among others.
Lucrecia R. Kasilag
(August 31, 1918 – August 16, 2008)
Lucrecia R. Kasilag, as educator, composer,

performing artist, administrator and cultural
entrepreneur of national and international caliber,
had involved herself wholly in sharpening the
Filipino audience’s appreciation of music. Kasilag’s
pioneering task to discover the Filipino roots
through ethnic music and fusing it with Western
influences has led many Filipino composers to
experiment with such an approach. She dared to
incorporate indigenous Filipino instruments in
orchestral productions, such as the prize-winning
“Toccata for Percussions and Winds,Divertissement and
Concertante,” and the scores of
the Filiasiana, Misang Pilipino and De Profundis.
“Tita King”, as she was fondly called, worked closely
as music director with colleagues Lucresia Reyes-
Urtula, Isabel Santos, Jose Lardizabal and Dr.
Leticia P. de Guzman and made Bayanihan Philippine
Dance Company one of the premier artistic and
cultural groups in the country.
Her orchestral music include Love Songs, Legend of

the Sarimanok, Ang Pamana, Philippine Scenes, Her
Son,Jose, Sisa and chamber music like Awit ng mga
Awit Psalms, Fantaisie on a 4-Note Theme, and East
Meets Jazz Ethnika.
Lucio San Pedro

(February 11, 1913 – March 31, 2002)
Lucio San Pedro is a master composer, conductor, and

teacher whose music evokes the folk elements of the
Filipino heritage. Cousin to “Botong” Francisco, San
Pedro has produced a wide-ranging body of works that
includes band music, concertos for violin and
orchestra, choral works, cantatas, chamber music,
music for violin and piano, and songs for solo voice.
He was the conductor of the much acclaimed Peng Kong
Grand Mason Concert Band, the San Pedro Band of
Angono, his father’s former band, and the Banda
Angono Numero Uno. His civic commitment and work with
town bands have significantly contributed to the
development of a civic culture among Filipino
communities and opened a creative outlet for young
Filipinos.
His orchestral music include The Devil’s

Bridge, Malakas at Maganda Overture,Prelude and Fugue
in D minor,Hope and Ambition; choral music Easter
Cantata, Sa Mahal Kong Bayan, Rizal’s Valedictory
Poem; vocal music Lulay,Sa Ugoy ng Duyan, In the
Silence of the Night; and band music Dance of the
Fairies, Triumphal March, Lahing
Kayumanggi, Angononian March among others.
Felipe Padilla de Leon

(May 1, 1912 – December 5, 1992)
Felipe Padilla de Leon, composer, conductor, and

scholar, Filipinized western music forms, a feat
aspired for by Filipino composers who preceded
him.The prodigious body of De Leon’s musical
compositions, notably the sonatas, marches and
concertos have become the full expression of the
sentiments and aspirations of the Filipino in times
of strife and of peace, making him the epitome of a
people’s musician. He is the recipient of various
awards and distinctions: Republic Cultural Heritage
Award, Doctor of Humanities from UP, Rizal Pro-Patria
Award, Presidential Award of Merit, Patnubay ng
Kalinangan Award, among others.
De Leon’s orchestral music include Mariang Makiling

Overture (1939), Roca Encantada, symphonic legend
(1950), Maynila Overture (1976), Orchesterstuk(1981);
choral music like Payapang Daigdig, Ako’y
Pilipino,Lupang Tinubuan, Ama Namin; and
songs Bulaklak, Alitaptap, and Mutya ng Lahi.
Jose Maceda
(January 31, 1917 – May 5, 2004)
Jose Maceda, composer, musicologist, teacher and

performer, explored the musicality of the Filipino
deeply. Maceda embarked on a life-long dedication to
the understanding and popularization of Filipino
traditional music. Maceda’s researches and fieldwork
have resulted in the collection of an immense number
of recorded music taken from the remotest mountain
villages and farthest island communities. He wrote
papers that enlightened scholars, both Filipino and
foreign, about the nature of Philippine traditional
and ethnic music. Maceda’s experimentation also freed
Filipino musical expression from a strictly
Eurocentric mold.
Usually performed as a communal ritual, his

compositions like Ugma-ugma(1963), Pagsamba (1968),
and Udlot-udlot (1975), are monuments to his
unflagging commitment to Philippine music. Other
major works includeAgungan, Kubing, Pagsamba,
Ugnayan, Ading, Aroding, Siasid, Suling-suling.
Levi Celerio
National Artist for Literature / Music (1997)
(April 30, 1910 – April 2, 2002)
Levi Celerio is a prolific lyricist and composer for

decades. He effortlessly translated/wrote anew the
lyrics to traditional melodies: “O Maliwanag Na
Buwan” (Iloko), “Ako ay May Singsing” (Pampango),
“Alibangbang” (Visaya) among others.
Born in Tondo, Celerio received his scholarship at

the Academy of Music in Manila that made it possible
for him to join the Manila Symphony Orchestra,
becoming its youngest member. He made it to the
Guinness Book of World Records as the only person
able to make music using just a leaf.
A great number of his songs have been written for the

local movies, which earned for him the Lifetime
Achievement Award from the Film Academy of the
Philippines. Levi Celerio, more importantly, has
enriched the Philippine music for no less than two
generations with a treasury of more than 4,000 songs
in an idiom that has proven to appeal to all social
classes.
Andrea Veneracion
(July 11, 1928 – July 9, 2013)
Andrea Veneracion, is highly esteemed for her

achievements as choirmaster and choral arranger. Two
of her indispensable contributions in culture and the
arts include the founding of the Philippine Madrigal
Singers and the spearheading of the development of
Philippine choral music. A former faculty member of
the UP College of Music and honorary chair of the
Philippine Federation of Choral Music, she also
organized a cultural outreach program to provide
music education and exposure in several provinces.
Born in Manila on July 11, 1928, she is recognized as
an authority on choral music and performance and has
served as adjudicator in international music
competitions.
Ernani J. Cuenco
(May 10, 1936 – June 11, 1988)
Ernani J. Cuenco is a seasoned musician born in May

10, 1936 in Malolos, Bulacan. A composer, film
scorer, musical director and music teacher, he wrote
an outstanding and memorable body of works that
resonate with the Filipino sense of musicality and
which embody an ingenious voice that raises the
aesthetic dimensions of contemporary Filipino music.
Cuenco played with the Filipino Youth Symphony
Orchestra and the Manila Symphony Orchestra from 1960
to 1968, and the Manila Chamber Soloists from 1966 to
1970. He completed a music degree in piano and cello
from the University of Santo Tomas where he also
taught for decades until his death in 1988.
His songs and ballads include “Nahan, Kahit na

Magtiis,” and “Diligin Mo ng Hamog ang Uhaw na Lupa,”
“Pilipinas,” “Inang Bayan,” “Isang Dalangin,”
“Kalesa,” “Bato sa Buhangin” and “Gaano Kita
Kamahal.” The latter song shows how Cuenco has
enriched the Filipino love ballad by adding the
elements of kundiman to it
Francisco Feliciano
(19 February 1941 – 19 September 2014)
Francisco Feliciano’s corpus of creative work attests

to the exceptional talent of the Filipino as an
artist. His lifetime conscientiousness in bringing
out the “Asianness” in his music, whether as a
composer, conductor, or educator, contributed to
bringing the awareness of people all over the world
to view the Asian culture as a rich source of
inspiration and a celebration of our ethnicity,
particularly the Philippines. He brought out the
unique sounds of our indigenous music in compositions
that have high technical demands equal to the
compositions of masters in the western world. By his
numerous creative outputs, he has elevated the
Filipino artistry into one that is highly esteemed by
the people all over the world.
Many of his choral compositions have been performed

by the best choirs in the country, such as the world
renowned Philippines Madrigal Singers, UST Singers
and the Novo Concertante Manila, and have won for
them numerous awards in international choral
competitions. The technical requirement of his choral
pieces are almost at the tip of the scale that many
who listen to their rendition are awed, especially
because he incorporates the many subtleties of
rhythmic vitality and intricate interweaving of lines
inspired from the songs of our indigenous tribes. He
not only borrows these musical lines, albeit he
quotes them and transforms them into completely
energetic fusions of sound and culture that does
nothing less than celebrate our various ethnicities.
His operas and orchestral works also showcase the

masterful treatment of a musical language that is
unique and carries with it a contemporary style that
allows for the use of modal scales, Feliciano’s
preferred tonality. The influence of bringing out the
indigenous culture, particularly in sound, is
strongly evident in La Loba Negra, Ashen Wings and
Yerma. In his modest hymns, Feliciano was able to
bring out the Filipino mysticism in the simple
harmonies that is able to captivate and charm his
audiences. It is his matchless genius in choosing to
state his ideas in their simplest state but producing
a haunting and long lasting impact on the listening
soul that makes his music extraordinarily sublime.
Major Works: Ashen Wings (1995), Sikhay sa Kabila ng

Paalam (1993), La Loba Negra (1983), Yerma (1982),
Pamugun (1995), Pokpok Alimako (1981)
Ramon Santos
(born 25 February 1941)
Ramon Pagayon Santos, composer, conductor and

musicologist, is currently the country’s foremost
exponent of contemporary Filipino music. A prime
figure in the second generation of Filipino composers
in the modern idiom, Santos has contributed greatly
to the quest for new directions in music, taking as
basis non-Western traditions in the Philippines and
Southeast Asia.
He graduated in 1965 from the UP College of Music

with a Teacher’s Diploma and a Bachelor of Music
degree in both Composition and Conducting. Higher
studies in the United States under a Fulbright
Scholarship at Indiana University (for a Master’s
degree, 1968) and at the State University of New York
at Buffalo (for a Doctorate, 1972) exposed him to the
world of contemporary and avant-garde musical idioms:
the rigorous processes of serialism, electronic and
contemporary music, indeterminacy, and new vocal and
improvisational techniques. He received further
training in New Music in Darmstadt, Germany and in
Utrecht, the Netherlands. His initial interest in
Mahler and Debussy while still a student at UP waned
as his compositional style shifted to Neo Classicism
and finally to a distinct merging of the varied
influences that he had assimilated abroad.
His return to the Philippines marked a new path in

his style. After immersing himself in indigenous
Philippine and Asian (Javanese music and dance,
Chinese nan kuan music), he became more interested in
open-ended structures of time and space, function as
a compositional concept, environmental works, non-
conventional instruments, the dialectics of control
and non-control, and the incorporation of natural
forces in the execution of sound-creating tasks. All
these would lead to the forging of a new alternative
musical language founded on a profound understanding
and a thriving and sensitive awareness of Asian music
aesthetics and culture.
Simultaneous with this was a reverting back to more

orthodox performance modes: chamber works and
multimedia works for dance and
theatre. Panaghoy (1984), for reader, voices, gongs
and bass drum, on the poetry of Benigno Aquino, Jr.
was a powerful musical discourse on the fallen
leader’s assassination in 1983, which subsequently
brought on the victorious People Power uprising in
1986.
An active musicologist, Santos’ interest in
traditional music cultures was heretofore realized in
1976 by embarking on fieldwork to collect and
document music from folk religious groups in Quezon.
He has also done research and fieldwork among the
Ibaloi of Northern Luzon. His ethnomusicological
orientation has but richly enhanced his compositional
outlook. Embedded in the works of this period are the
people-specific concepts central to the
ethnomusicological discipline, the translation of
indigenous musical systems into modern musical
discourse, and the marriage of Western and non-
Western sound.
An intense and avid pedagogue, Santos, as Chair of

the Department of Compositiion and Theory (and
formerly, as Dean) of the College of Music, UP, has
remained instrumental in espousing a modern
Philippine music rooted in old Asian practices and
life concepts. With generation upon generation of
students and teachers that have come under his wing,
he continues to shape a legacy of modernity anchored
on the values of traditional Asian music.
FILM
Lamberto V. Avellana
National Artist for Theater and Film (1976)
born on August 31, 1912
Lamberto V. Avellana, director for theater and film,

has the distinction of being called “The Boy Wonder
of Philippine Movies” as early as 1939. He was the
first to use the motion picture camera to establish a
point-of-view, a move that revolutionized the
techniques of film narration. Avellana, who at 20
portrayed Joan of Arc in time for Ateneo’s diamond
jubilee, initially set out to establish a Filipino
theater. Together with Daisy Hontiveros, star of many
UP plays and his future wife, he formed the Barangay
Theater Guild which had, among others, Leon Ma
.Guerrero and Raul Manglapus as members. It was after
seeing such plays that Carlos P. Romulo, then
president of Philippine Films, encouraged him to try
his hand at directing films. In his first film Sakay,
Avellana demonstrated a kind of visual rhythm that
established a new filmic language.
Sakay was declared the best picture of 1939 by

critics and journalists alike and set the tone for
Avellana’s career in film that would be capped by
such distinctive achievements as the Grand Prix at
the Asian Film Festival in Hong Kong for Anak
Dalita (1956); Best Director of Asia award in Tokyo
for Badjao, among others.
Avellana was also the first filmmaker to have his

film Kandelerong Pilak shown at the Cannes
International Film Festival. Among the films he
directed for worldwide release were Sergeant
Hasan (1967), Destination Vietnam(1969), and The Evil
Within (1970).
Manuel Conde
National Artist for Cinema (2009)
(October 9, 1915 – August 11, 1985)
Christened Manuel Pabustan Urbano, Manuel Conde grew

up and studied in Daet, Camarines Norte.In the
decades before and after World War II when Philippine
society was being inundated by American popular
culture, Conde invested local cinema with a distinct
cultural history of its own through movies that
translated onto the silver screen the age-old stories
that Filipinos had told and retold from generation to
generation for at least the past one hundred years.
Among the narratives that Conde directed and/or
produced for the screen were three of the most famous
metrical romances in Philippine lowland
culture: Siete Infantes de Lara, Ibong Adarna,
and Prinsipe Tenoso.
Through the more than forty films he created from

1940 to 1963, Manuel Conde contributed in no small
measure to the indigenization of the cinema,
specifically: by assigning it a history and culture
of its own; by revitalizing folk culture with urgent
issues, fresh themes and new techniques; by depicting
and critiquing Filipino customs, values and
traditions according to the needs of the present; by
employing and at the same time innovating on the
traditional cinematic genres of his time; and by
opening the local cinema to the world.
With a curious mind and restless spirit that could

not be contained by what is, Conde went beyond the
usual narratives of the traditional genres and
ventured into subject matter that would have been
deemed too monumental or quixotic by the average
producer. Conde dared to recreate on screen the grand
narratives of larger-than-life figures from world
history and literature, like Genghis
Khan and Sigfredo. In doing films on these world
figures, Conde had in effect forced the Filipino
moviegoer out of the parochial and predictable
concerns of the run-of-the-mill formulaic film and
thrust him into a larger world where visions and
emotions were loftier and nobler and very very far
from the pedestrian whims and sentiments that
constituted the Filipino moviegoer’s usual fare.
Serendipitously, as these movies opened the vistas of

the Filipino film to other cultures, they also
unlocked the doors of western cinema to the Filipino
film, allowing it entry into one of the most
prestigious film festivals of the globe. Later,
when these films were bought by foreign distributors,
they were exhibited in all parts of the cinematic
world of the time, establishing the presence of the
Filipino cinema in the eyes of that world.
Major works: Ibong Adarna (1941), Si Juan

Tamad (1947), Siete Infantes de Lara (1950), Genghis
Khan (1950),Ikaw Kasi! (1955) Juan Tamad Goes To
Congress (1959).
CINEMA
Gerardo De Leon
(September 12, 1913 – July 25, 1981)
Gerardo “Gerry” De Leon, film director, belongs to

the Ilagan clan and as such grew up in an atmosphere
rich in theater. Significantly, De Leon’s first job —
while in still in high school — was as a piano player
at Cine Moderno in Quiapo playing the musical
accompaniment to the silent films that were being
shown at that time. The silent movies served as De
Leon’s “very good” training ground because the
pictures told the story. Though he finished medicine,
his practice did not last long because he found
himself “too compassionate” to be one, this aside
from the lure of the movies. His first directorial
job was “Ama’t Anak” in which he directed himself and
his brother Tito Arevalo. The movie got good reviews.
De Leon’s biggest pre-war hit was “Ang Maestra” which
starred Rogelio de la Rosa and Rosa del Rosario with
the still unknown Eddie Romero as writer.
In the 50s and 60s, he produced many films that are
now considered classics including “Daigdig ng Mga
Api,” “Noli Me Tangere,” “El Filibusterismo,” and
“Sisa.” Among a long list of films are “Sawa sa
Lumang Simboryo,” “Dyesebel,” “The Gold Bikini,”
“Banaue,” “The Brides of Blood Island.”.
Lino Brocka
(April 3, 1939 – May 22, 1991)
Catalino “Lino” Ortiz Brocka, director for film and

broadcast arts, espoused the term “freedom of
expression” in the Philippine Constitution. Brocka
took his social activist spirit to the screen leaving
behind 66 films which breathed life and hope for the
marginalized sectors of society — slumdwellers,
prostitute, construction workers, etc. He also
directed for theater with equal zeal and served in
organizations that offer alternative visions, like
the Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA)
and the Concerned Artists of the Philippines (CAP).
At the same time, he garnered awards and recognition
from institutions like the CCP, FAMAS, TOYM, and
Cannes Film Festival. Lino Brocka has left behind his
masterpieces, bequeathing to our country a heritage
of cinematic harvest; a bounty of stunning images,
memorable conversations that speak volumes on
love,betrayal and redemption, pestilence and plenty
all pointing towards the recovery and rediscovery of
our nation.
To name a few, Brocka’s films include the following:

“Santiago” (1970), “Wanted: Perfect Mother” (1970),
“Tubog sa Ginto” (1971), “Stardoom” (1971),
“Tinimbang Ka Ngunit Kulang” (1974), “Maynila: Sa
Kuko ng Liwanag” (1975), “Insiang” (1976), “Jaguar”
(1979), “Bona” (1980), “Macho Dancer” (1989),
“Orapronobis” (1989), “Makiusap Ka sa Diyos” (1991).
Ishmael Bernal
(September 30, 1938 – June 2, 1996)
Ishmael Bernal was a filmmaker of the first order and

one of the very few who can be truly called a
maestro. Critics have hailed him as “the genius of
Philippine cinema.”
He is recognized as a director of films that serve as

social commentaries and bold reflections on the
existing realities of the struggle of the Filipino.
His art extends beyond the confines of aesthetics. By
polishing its visuals, or innovating in the medium,
he manages to send his message across: to fight the
censors, free the artists, give justice to the
oppressed, and enlighten as well as entertain the
audience.
Among his notable films are “Pahiram ng Isang Umaga”

(1989), “Broken Marriage” (1983), “Himala” (1982),
“City After Dark” (1980), and “Nunal sa Tubig”
(1976).
He was recognized as the Director of the Decade of

the 1970s by the Catholic Mass Media Awards; four-
time Best Director by the Urian Awards (1989, 1985,
1983, and 1977); and given the ASEAN Cultural Award
in Communication Arts in 1993.
Eddie Romero
(July 7, 1924 – May 28, 2013)
Eddie Romero, is a screenwriter, film director and
producer, is the quintessential Filipino filmmaker
whose life is devoted to the art and commerce of
cinema spanning three generations of filmmakers. His
film “Ganito Kami Noon…Paano Kayo Ngayon?,” set at
the turn of the century during the revolution against
the Spaniards and, later, the American colonizers,
follows a naïve peasant through his leap of faith to
become a member of an imagined community. “Aguila”
situates a family’s story against the backdrop of the
country’s history. “Kamakalawa” explores the
folkloric of prehistoric Philippines. “Banta ng
Kahapon,” his ‘small’ political film, is set against
the turmoil of the late 1960s, tracing the connection
of the underworld to the corrupt halls of politics.
His 13-part series of “Noli Me Tangere” brings the
national hero’s polemic novel to a new generation of
viewers.
Romero, the ambitious yet practical artist, was not

satisfied with dreaming up grand ideas. He found ways
to produce these dreams into films. His concepts,
ironically, as stated in the National Artist citation
“are delivered in an utterly simple style –
minimalist, but never empty, always calculated,
precise and functional, but never predictable.”
Fernando Poe, Jr.,

(August 20, 1939 – December 14, 2004)
Ronald Allan K. Poe, popularly known as Fernando Poe,

Jr., was a cultural icon of tremendous audience
impact and cinema artist and craftsman–as actor,
director, writer and producer.*
The image of the underdog was projected in his films
such as Apollo Robles(1961), Batang
Maynila (1962), Mga Alabok sa Lupa (1967), Batang
Matador and Batang Estibador (1969), Ako ang
Katarungan (1974), Tatak ng Alipin(1975), Totoy
Bato (1977), Asedillo (1981), Partida (1985), and Ang
Probisyano (1996), among many others. The mythical
hero, on the other hand, was highlighted in Ang
Alamat (1972), Ang Pagbabalik ng Lawin(1975)
including his Panday series (1980, 1981, 1982, 1984)
and the action adventure films adapted from komiks
materials such as Ang Kampana sa Santa
Quiteria(1971), Santo Domingo (1972), and Alupihang
Dagat (1975), among others.
Poe was born in Manila on August 20, 1939. After the

death of his father, he dropped out of the University
of the East in his sophomore year to support his
family. He was the second of six siblings. He married
actress Susan Roces in a civil ceremony in December
1968.
He died on December 14, 2004
ARCHITECTURE
Juan F. Nakpil
National Artist for Architecture, 1973
(May 26, 1899 – May 7, 1986)
Juan F. Nakpil, architect, teacher and civic leader,

is a pioneer and innovator in Philippine
architecture. In essence, Nakpil’s greatest
contribution is his belief that there is such a thing
as Philippine Architecture, espousing architecture
reflective of Philippine traditions and culture. It
is also largely due to his zealous representation and
efforts that private Filipino architects and
engineers, by law, are now able to participate in the
design and execution of government projects. He has
integrated strength, function, and beauty in the
buildings that are the country’s heritage today. He
designed the 1937 International Eucharistic Congress
altar and rebuilt and enlarged the Quiapo Church in
1930 adding a dome and a second belfry to the
original design.
Among others, Nakpil’s major works are the Geronimo

de los Reyes Building,Magsaysay Building, Rizal
Theater, Capitol Theater, Captain Pepe
Building, Manila Jockey Club, Rufino
Building, Philippine Village Hotel, University of the
Philippines Administration and University Library,
and the reconstructed Rizal housein Calamba, Laguna.
Pablo Antonio
Architecture (1976)
(January 25, 1901 – June 14, 1975)
Born at the turn of the century, National Artist

for Architecture Pablo Sebero Antonio pioneered
modern Philippine architecture. His basic design is
grounded on simplicity, no clutter. The lines are
clean and smooth, and where there are curves, these
are made integral to the structure. Pablo Jr. points
out, “For our father, every line must have a meaning,
a purpose. For him, function comes first before
elegance or form“. The other thing that characterizes
an Antonio structure is the maximum use of natural
light and cross ventilation. Antonio believes that
buildings “should be planned with austerity in mind
and its stability forever as the aim of true
architecture, that buildings must be progressive,
simple in design but dignified, true to a purpose
without resorting to an applied set of aesthetics and
should eternally recreate truth”.
Antonio’s major works include the following: Far
Eastern University Administration and Science
buildings;Manila Polo Club; Ideal Theater;Lyric
Theater; Galaxy Theater; Capitan Luis Gonzaga
Building; Boulevard-Alhambra (now Bel-Air)
apartments; Ramon Roces Publications Building (now
Guzman Institute of Electronics).
Leandro V. Locsin
(August 15, 1928 – November 15, 1994)
Leandro V. Locsin reshaped the urban landscape with a

distinctive architecture reflective of Philippine Art
and Culture. He believes that the true Philippine
Architecture is “the product of two great streams of
culture, the oriental and the occidental… to produce
a new object of profound harmony.” It is this
synthesis that underlies all his works, with his
achievements in concrete reflecting his mastery of
space and scale. Every Locsin Building is an
original, and identifiable as a Locsin with themes of
floating volume, the duality of light and heavy,
buoyant and massive running in his major works. From
1955 to 1994, Locsin has produced 75 residences and
88 buildings, including 11 churches and chapels, 23
public buildings, 48 commercial buildings, six major
hotels, and an airport terminal building.
Locsin’s largest single work is the Istana Nurul

Iman, the palace of the Sultan of Brunei, which has a
floor area of 2.2 million square feet. The CCP
Complex itself is a virtual Locsin Complex with all
five buildings designed by him — the Cultural Center
of the Philippines, Folk Arts Theater, Philippine
International Convention Center, Philcite and The
Westin Hotel (now Sofitel Philippine Plaza).
Ildefonso Santos
(September 5, 1929 – January 29, 2014)
Ildefonso Paez Santos, Jr., distinguished himself by

pioneering the practice of landscape architecture–an
allied field of architecture–in the Philippines and
then producing four decades of exemplary and engaging
work that has included hundreds of parks, plazas,
gardens, and a wide range of outdoor settings that
have enhanced contemporary Filipino life.
Santos, Jr., who grew up in Malabon, made his first

mark with the Makati Commercial Center where he
introduced a new concept of outdoor shopping with
landscaped walks, fountains and sculptures as
accents. Santos, Jr.’s contribution to modern
Filipino landscape architecture was the seminal
public landscape in Paco Park.
Santos, Jr.’s most recent projects were the Tagaytay

Highland Resort, the Mt. Malarayat Golf and Country
Clubin Lipa, Batangas, and the Orchard Golf and
Country Club in Imus, Cavite.
Jose Maria Zaragoza

National Artist for Architecture (2014)
(1912-1994)
José María V. Zaragoza’s place in Philippine

architecture history is defined by a significant body
of modern edifices that address spiritual and secular
requirements. Zaragoza’s name is synonymous to modern
ecclesiastical architecture. Â Notwithstanding his
affinity to liturgical structures, he greatly
excelled in secular works: 36 office buildings, 4
hotels, 2, hospitals, 5 low-cost and middle-income
housing projects; and more than 270 residences – all
demonstrating his typological versatility and his
mastery of modernist architectural vocabulary.
Zaragoza graduated from the University of Santo Tomas

in Manila in 1936, passing the licensure examinations
in 1938 to become the 82nd architect of the
Philippines. With growing interest in specializing in
religious architecture, Zaragoza also studied at
International Institute of Liturgical Art (IILA) in
Rome in the late 1950s, where he obtained a diploma
in liturgical art and architecture. His training in
Rome resulted in innovative approaches, setting new
standards for the design of mid-century Catholic
churches in the Philippines. His prolificacy in
designing religious edifices was reflected in his
body of work that was predominated by about 45
churches and religious centers, including the Santo
Domingo Church, Our Lady of Rosary in Tala, Don Bosco
Church, the Convent of the Pink Sisters, the San Beda
Convent, Villa San Miguel, Pius XII Center, the Union
Church, and the controversial restoration of the
Quiapo Church, among others.
Zaragoza is a pillar of modern architecture in

Philippines buttressed by a half-century career that
produced ecclesiastical edifices and structures of
modernity in the service of God and humanity.
Major Works: Meralco Building (Pasig Cty), Sto.

Domingo Church and Convent (Quezon City),
Metropolitan Cathedral of Cebu City, Villa San
Miguel, Mandaluyoung.
FASHION DESIGN
Ramon Valera
National Artist for Fashion Design (2006)
(August 31, 1912 – May 25, 1972)
The contribution of Ramon Valera, whose family hails

from Abra, lies in the tradition of excellence of his
works, and his committment to his profession,
performing his magical seminal innovations on the
Philippine terno.
Valera is said to have given the country its visual

icon to the world via the terno. In the early 40s,
Valera produced a single piece of clothing from a
four-piece ensemble consisting of a blouse, skirt,
overskirt, and long scarf. He unified the components
of the baro’t saya into a single dress with
exaggerated bell sleeves, cinched at the waist,
grazing the ankle, and zipped up at the back. Using
zipper in place of hooks was already a radical change
for the country’s elite then. Dropping the panuelo–
the long folded scarf hanging down the chest, thus
serving as the Filipina’s gesture of modesty–from the
entire ensemble became a bigger shock for the women
then. Valera constructed the terno’s butterfly
sleeves, giving them a solid, built-in but hidden
support. To the world, the butterfly sleeves became
the terno’s defining feature.
Even today, Filipino fashion designers study Valera’s

ternos: its construction, beadworks, applique, etc.
*Valera helped mold generations of artists, and
helped fashion to become no less than a nation’s
sense of aesthetics. But more important than these,
he helped form a sense of the Filipino nation by his
pursuit of excellence.
THEATER DESIGN
Salvador Floro Bernal
(1945 – October 26, 2011)
Salvador Floro Bernal was an acclaimed artist from

the Philippines. Bernal's career began in 1969. His
output included over 300 productions in art, film and
music, and earned him the award of National Artist
for Theater and Design in 2003.
THEATER
Honorata “Atang” Dela Rama

National Artist for Theater and Music (1987)
(January 11, 1902 – July 11, 1991)
Honorata “Atang” Dela Rama was formally honored as

the Queen of Kundiman in 1979, then already 74 years
old singing the same song (“Nabasag na Banga”) that
she sang as a 15-year old girl in the
sarsuela Dalagang Bukid. Atang became the very first
actress in the very first Tagalog film when she
essayed the same role in the sarsuela’s film version.
As early as age seven, Atang was already being cast
in Spanish zarzuelas such as Mascota, Sueño de un
Vals, andMarina. She counts the role though of an
orphan in Pangarap ni Rosa as her most rewarding and
satisfying role that she played with realism, the
stage sparkling with silver coins tossed by a teary-
eyed audience. Atang firmly believes that the
sarswela and the kundiman expresses best the Filipino
soul, and has even performed kundiman and other
Filipino songs for the Aetas or Negritos of Zambales
and the Sierra Madre, the Bagobos of Davao and other
Lumad of Mindanao.
Among the kundiman and the other songs she premiered

or popularized were Pakiusap, Ay, Ay Kalisud, Kung
Iibig Ka and Madaling Araw by Jose Corazon de Jesus,
and Mutya ng Pasig by Deogracias Rosario and Nicanor
Abelardo. She also wrote her own sarswelas: Anak ni
Eba, Aking Ina, and Puri at Buhay.
Wilfrido Ma. Guerrero

National Artist for Theater (1997)
(January 22, 1910 – April 28, 1995)
Wilfrido Ma. Guerrero is a teacher and theater artist

whose 35 years of devoted professorship has produced
the most sterling luminaries in Philippine performing
arts today: Behn Cervantes, Celia Diaz-Laurel, Joy
Virata, Joonee Gamboa, etc. In 1947, he was appointed
as UP Dramatic Club director and served for 16 years.
As founder and artistic director of the UP Mobile
Theater, he pioneered the concept of theater campus
tour and delivered no less than 2,500 performances in
a span of 19 committed years of service. By bringing
theatre to countryside, Guerrero made it possible for
students and audiences in general to experience the
basic grammar of staging and acting in familiar and
friendly ways through his plays that humorously
reflect the behavior of the Filipino.
His plays include Half an Hour in a Convent, Wanted:

A Chaperon, Forever, Condemned, Perhaps, In Unity,
Deep in My Heart, Three Rats, Our Strange Ways, The
Forsaken House, Frustrations.
Rolando S. Tinio
National Artist for Theater and Literature (1997)
(March 5, 1937 – July 7, 1997)
Rolando S. Tinio, playwright, thespian, poet,

teacher, critic and translator, marked his career
with prolific artistic productions. Tinio’s chief
distinction is as a stage director whose original
insights into the scripts he handled brought forth
productions notable for their visual impact and
intellectual cogency. Subsequently, after staging
productions for the Ateneo Experimental Theater (its
organizer and administrator as well), he took on
Teatro Pilipino. It was to Teatro Pilipino which he
left a considerable amount of work reviving
traditional Filipino drama by re-staging old theater
forms like the sarswela and opening a treasure-house
of contemporary Western drama. It was the excellence
and beauty of his practice that claimed for theater a
place among the arts in the Philippines in the 1960s.
Aside from his collections of poetry (Sitsit sa

Kuliglig, Dunung – Dunungan, Kristal na Uniberso, A
Trick of Mirrors) among his works were the following:
film scripts for Now and Forever, Gamitin Mo Ako,
Bayad Puri andMilagros; sarswelas Ang Mestisa, Ako,
Ang Kiri, Ana Maria; the komedya Orosman at Zafira;
and Larawan, the musical.
Daisy H. Avellana
(January 26, 1917 – May 12, 2013)
Daisy H. Avellana, is an actor, director and writer.

Born in Roxas City, Capiz on January 26, 1917, she
elevated legitimate theater and dramatic arts to a
new level of excellence by staging and performing in
breakthrough productions of classic Filipino and
foreign plays and by encouraging the establishment of
performing groups and the professionalization of
Filipino theater. Together with her husband, National
Artist Lamberto Avellana and other artists, she co-
founded the Barangay Theatre Guild in 1939 which
paved the way for the popularization of theatre and
dramatic arts in the country, utilizing radio and
television.
She starred in plays like Othello (1953), Macbeth in
Black (1959), Casa de Bernarda Alba (1967), Tatarin.
She is best remembered for her portrayal of Candida
Marasigan in the stage and film versions of Nick
Joaquin’s Portrait of the Artist as Filipino. Her
directorial credits include Diego Silang (1968),
and Walang Sugat (1971). Among her screenplays
were Sakay (1939) and Portrait of the Artist as
Filipino (1955).
Severino Montano
Playwright, director, actor, and theater

organizer Severino Montano is the forerunner in
institutionalizing “legitimate theater” in the
Philippines. Taking up courses and graduate degrees
abroad, he honed and shared his expertise with his
countrymates.
As Dean of Instruction of the Philippine Normal
College, Montano organized the Arena Theater to bring
drama to the masses. He trained and directed the new
generations of dramatists including Rolando S. Tinio,
Emmanuel Borlaza, Joonee Gamboa, and Behn Cervantes.
He established a graduate program at the Philippine

Normal College for the training of playwrights,
directors, technicians, actors, and designers. He
also established the Arena Theater Playwriting
Contest that led to the discovery of Wilfrido
Nolledo, Jesus T. Peralta, and Estrella Alfon.
Among his awards and recognitions are the Patnubay ng

Kalinangan Award from the City of Manila (1968),
Presidential Award for Merit in Drama and Theater
(1961), and the Rockefeller Foundation Grant to
travel to 98 cities abroad (1950, 1952, 1962, and
1963).
Source: National Commission for Culture and Arts

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The National Artist Award is the highest distinction

bestowed upon Filipino Artists whose body of work is

President Ferdinand E. Marcos through proclamation

• Living artists who have been Filipino citizens

• Artists who have helped build a Filipino sense of

• Artists who have distinguished themselves by

• Artists who have created a significant body of

• Artists who enjoy broad acceptance through

Fernando Cueto Amorsolo

Carlos “Botong” Francisco,

Popularly known as "Botong", was a distinguished

His major works includes Portrait of Purita, The

He was the second Filipino who received the title of

Painting distorted human figures in rough, bold

It was also the time that Edades invited Carlos

Vicente Manansala‘s paintings are described as

He trained at Paris and at Otis School of Drawing in

Jeremias Elizalde Navarro

J. (Jeremias) Elizalde Navarro, was born on May 22,

A Navarro sampler includes his ’50s and ’60s fiction

He espoused the value of kinetic energy and

Joya also led the way for younger artists in bringing

His legacy is undeniably a large body of work of

A pioneer “Neo-Realist” of the country, Cesar

Among his works are Gadgets I, Gadgets

Hernando R. Ocampo, a self-taught painter, was a

Ocampo’s acknowledged masterpiece Genesis served as

Arturo Luz, painter, sculptor, and designer for more

Born to immigrant Chinese parents Vicente Ang and

He crystallized in vivid, cubistic figures the terror

Some of his works include: Geometric

His works can be found in many major art collections,

Benedicto R. Cabrera, *who signs his paintings

Bencab’s exploration of form, finding his way out of

Madonna with Objects, 1991

Abdulmari Asia Imao

Through his works, the indigenous ukkil, sarimanok

His U.P. art education introduced him to Filipino

With his large-scale sculptures and monuments of

Industry Brass Mural, Philippine National Bank, San

Federico Aguilar y Alcuaz

Federico Aguilar y Alcuaz, who signed his works as

Alcuaz belongs to the second generation of Filipino

Alcuaz would go on in 1955 to obtain a law degree at

After his studies, he stayed on to live and

His works are highly favored, not only for its

Francisco Coching, acknowledged as the “Dean of

Starting his career in 1934, he was a central force

The source of his imagery can be traced to the

There is myth and fantasy, too, featuring the

In his characters and storylines, Coching brings to

Guillermo Estrella Tolentino

Guillermo Estrella Tolentino is a product of the

Other works include the bronze figures of President

He also designed the gold and bronze medals for

At 46 then, Napoleon V. Abueva, a native of Bohol,

Some of his major works

Francisca Reyes Aquino is acknowledged as the Folk

Her books include the following: Philippine National