A ‘Dwelling Place’ for Noel M. Elicana

Ilonggo artist Noel M. Elicana’s ‘Dwelling Place’ opened its doors last October 3 in Makati’s Art Cube Gallery, bringing once again Ilonggo aesthetic sensibilities into the capital’s art scene. Far from the maternal themes of his solo exhibit last year, the artist explored new grounds in this current collection, perambulating through reflections and representations of what one might call a dwelling place.

The exhibit proposed a question: What are the places and persons one calls home?

As the wall-text pointed out, the art ‘explores a very personal take on what one might consider as habitation, where one finds a sense of identity and belonging, of familiarity and comfort.’ It attempts to break through the ideas of space and place, where location is shown as a metaphorical perimeter where one is free to wander and reflect. In other canvases, persona is portrayed as both emphatic Self and Other, featuring both identity and belongingness.

Elicana is known for his layered paintings, one which superimposes surreal imagery and detail on his favored abstract expressionist splattering of oil paint rendered on wide stretches of canvas. He does his storytelling in these spaces. Most observable in this exhibit are scenes gleaned from spirituality, religion, myth, and narrative, as if the painter finds homely comfort and security in the retelling. Surfacing on the canvas are some of his own artistic idiosyncrasies: the layering itself, the fine thread-like wisps that course through and criss-cross between figures, and the vast dimensions of his art.

One can but imagine the process of creating the artworks. The abstracted splattering begins en plein air, to accommodate the vast dimensions on which Elicana works on. Then the canvas progresses into the work studio where this is suspended, to give it more maneuverability as the painter crafts and adds the minutiae of design and detail. Looking closely at the art, one finds figures and faces in varied poses, endowing the works with a humane and child-like touch. There are phantasmagorical flora and fauna as backdrop to this human drama, serving as both landscape and bridge to connect the dramatis personae in the scenes. All in all, there is a carefree euphoria in the images, a vibrant longing and hopefulness in life.

For instance, in ‘Pinagmumulan’, the massive trunk of a tree inundates the artwork, his take of a stylized Yggdrasil, the cosmic world-tree of Norse lore which serves as pillar to the many worlds attached to it. Rather than holding a multiplicity of cosmos, its bare branches drip with purple fronds, each bearing in its core a minute human form, as if to nurture its hidden humanity within. Traversing these branches are weblike wisps, emanating from the tree’s core and spreading out like a grotesquely slithering bridge. This arboreal theme recurs in other canvases. In ‘Daloy ng Liwanag’, this takes on a much wider spread, incorporating fantastic figures of sprites and spirits: here is the tree as home and hearth. Conversely, his ‘Pagbibigkis ng Pugad’ reiterates the domicile as a bird’s nesting enclosure, secure and caring in its warmth and isolation.

The persona too becomes home and hearth: the artist had no qualms underlining the idea that the people who surround us constitute much of what we consider as one’s abode. In ‘Pamilya sa Lilim ng Diyos’, home becomes the warmth of a divine embrace, clasping dearly a nest enclosed on which are two smaller embracing figures. With a nod to portraiture, ‘Kaloob-Looban’ encapsulates a female form within a thorny shell, something akin to a protective exoskeleton, even as it safeguards the small figure in its core.

In a sense, these works are Elicana’s dwelling place (the singular is deliberate). In these, his imagination runs wild, projecting a sense of uninhibited selfhood onto the canvas while also exuding a deeply spiritual understanding of the world around him; on these are birthed a genesis of worlds, insights, and relationships kept dearly hidden in the artist’s mind — and what is the mind if not the first domus of all artistic endeavor?

A final comment: the exuberance of youth is hardly the stuff of Elicana’s earlier works. Drop by Iloilo’s City Hall and you will find one of his monumental works, all shadowy, somber, and imposing in subject and detail. But now, he seems to have moved past that: there is now vibrance, whimsy, and guileless wonder in his works. He has found his home and hearth.

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‘Dwelling Place’ will be on exhibit in Art Cube Gallery until October 31.

(The writer is a humanities teacher in one of the private schools in the city. Photos of the artworks are from the artist and Jirah Labanza.)