By Noel Galon de Leon

There is something profoundly fragile about the visual arts community in Iloilo City today. Ironically, that fragility exists at the very moment when the scene appears to be flourishing. New exhibitions are mounted almost every month. New artist collectives continue to emerge from different parts of Western Visayas. Younger artists are finding the confidence to exhibit, while new audiences are beginning to pay attention. Yet beneath this appearance of growth lies an ecosystem that remains remarkably vulnerable. Development is not measured by the number of exhibitions held or the quantity of artworks displayed. It is measured by whether a community possesses the maturity to confront difficult conversations without destroying itself in the process.

As someone who has spent years closely observing the evolution of the Iloilo art scene, I have become increasingly convinced that this is one of the most critical moments in its history. We are witnessing the birth of new institutions while simultaneously watching older artist groups fade away. We are negotiating new relationships among artists, galleries, curators, collectors, critics, and organizers without fully establishing the ethical foundations that should govern those relationships. This is precisely why criticism today demands greater care. Our words matter because our community is still small. Every accusation, every public humiliation, and every careless statement reverberates far beyond a single controversy. It affects trust, collaboration, and the future of our cultural landscape.

What concerns me most is how easily we have begun turning one another into enemies. Whenever controversy emerges, our first instinct seems to be to identify which artist should be blamed. Social media accelerates this impulse. It rewards outrage more than understanding and spectacle more than context. Before long, the artist becomes the public face of a scandal, while the structures that enabled the controversy remain comfortably invisible. That is perhaps the greatest tragedy. We attack individuals while allowing systems to escape accountability.

Our fellow artists are not our enemies. The real adversary is the system that operates behind these events: the structures of decision-making, the absence of institutional safeguards, the lack of professional standards, and the failures of communication that repeatedly place artists in vulnerable positions. If we are genuinely committed to strengthening the visual arts community in Iloilo, then our questions must become far more uncomfortable than simply asking which artist made a mistake.

Instead, we should ask: Who approved these decisions? Who possessed the authority to allow them? Who determined the policies governing the exhibition? What conversations took place among the organizers, the curator, and the participating artists? Were artists properly informed about authorship, copyright, attribution, artistic ethics, and public presentation? Were concerns raised and ignored? Or were these conversations never held at all?

These are not minor procedural questions. They are the very questions that determine whether an artistic community functions responsibly.

The controversies surrounding Art for Everyone 2026 at SM City Iloilo illustrate why these questions matter. As the organizer of the exhibition, SM City Iloilo carries a responsibility that extends beyond providing a venue. An exhibition is not simply a display of artworks inside a commercial space. It is a public cultural undertaking that involves artists’ reputations, creative labor, intellectual property, and professional identities.

Public discussion has largely centered on the participating artists, as though they alone carry the burden of responsibility. But is that truly where responsibility begins and ends? I find that difficult to accept. Artists rarely operate alone within organized exhibitions. Their works pass through organizers, coordinators, exhibition managers, curators, venue administrators, and layers of approval before they reach the public. If failures occurred, then accountability should also move through those same layers.

This is why SM City Iloilo, as an organizer and cultural platform, must recognize that supporting the arts requires more than providing exhibition space. It requires creating systems that protect artists. It requires clear guidelines, careful review processes, proper documentation, meaningful communication, and professional standards that prevent controversies before they happen.

A responsible curator does far more than arrange artworks beautifully on a wall. A curator anticipates problems before they become public controversies. A curator provides intellectual guidance, ethical clarity, and professional direction. A curator understands aesthetics, copyright, authorship, artistic integrity, documentation, exhibition protocols, and the broader implications of curatorial decisions. These matters should have been discussed long before an exhibition opened and before public criticism erupted.

Likewise, organizers carry responsibilities beyond logistics and publicity. Organizing an exhibition is not simply about securing a venue, attracting visitors, or creating a successful event. It is about creating conditions in which artists are protected rather than exposed. No artist should become the center of a public controversy because institutional safeguards were absent or because difficult conversations were avoided during the planning process.

This is why it is deeply unfair when artists alone become the targets of public condemnation. Even more troubling is watching artists, photographers, cultural workers, and critics turn against one another while the institutional conditions that produced the controversy remain largely unquestioned. Iloilo’s artistic community is small. Every damaged relationship weakens the entire ecosystem.

None of this means that criticism should be silenced. Criticism is essential to the health of any artistic community. Communities that cannot criticize themselves eventually stagnate. Silence is not maturity. Agreement is not progress. Healthy disagreement is proof that people still care about the future of the arts.

But criticism must distinguish between accountability and humiliation. It must seek understanding before condemnation. It must challenge systems as vigorously as it questions individuals. It must illuminate rather than simply punish.

The Iloilo art community should not fear moments like this. Every developing cultural ecosystem experiences conflict. These moments reveal weaknesses, expose blind spots, and force necessary conversations into the open. That is how institutions mature. That is how professional standards emerge. That is how communities grow stronger.

So let everyone speak. Let artists respond. Let critics critique. Let photographers, curators, organizers, collectors, scholars, and audiences participate in the conversation. Public discourse is healthy when grounded in respect and intellectual honesty. But let us resist the temptation to shame fellow artists simply because they are the most visible participants in a controversy. Visibility should never be mistaken for sole responsibility.

If this moment is to become more than another fleeting social media spectacle, then we must redirect our attention toward deeper questions. We must examine the systems that shape artistic practices, the institutions that govern exhibitions, and the responsibilities carried by those entrusted with leadership. Only then can accountability become meaningful rather than performative.

The future of Iloilo’s visual arts community will not be determined by how loudly we denounce one another. It will be determined by whether we possess the courage to confront the structures that continue to produce these conflicts. Our fellow artists are not the easiest enemies to attack. They are simply the most visible. The harder task — and the more necessary one — is to question the systems that remain hidden behind the exhibition walls.

Dear SM City Iloilo, this is not a call to abandon support for the arts. On the contrary, this is a call for deeper responsibility. When institutions choose to become platforms for culture, they also accept the responsibility of protecting the people who create that culture. Artists deserve more than a space to display their works. They deserve guidance, transparency, and an environment where creativity is encouraged without leaving them vulnerable to public harm.

The strength of Iloilo’s art community will not be measured by how many exhibitions we can organize. It will be measured by how responsibly we handle the difficult moments that reveal our weaknesses. This is the opportunity before us: not to find someone to blame, but to build a cultural ecosystem where artists, organizers, institutions, and audiences can move forward with greater integrity.

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Noel Galon de Leon is a writer and professor at the University of the Philippines Visayas, where he teaches in the Division of Professional Education and at UP High School in Iloilo. He is also the secretary of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts’ National Committee on Literary Arts.