The Yaru nu Artes Ivatan is an informal group of four dedicated young Ivatan artists who share the same passion for the arts. They work to awaken innate Ivatan talent in the arts among young Ivatans today. They promote fellowship in the visual, written and performing arts through painting.
Their works have been exhibited at the Cultural Center of the Philippines, the Headlands Center for the arts in San Francisco, United States and the Museo Pambata in Manila. Few more works have found their way into many prominent private collections in the Philippines and abroad.
We work in partnership with the Pacita Abad Center for the Arts, the Karasic Foundation, the Department of Education, Department of Trade and Industry, and various local government units. We have likewise completed projects with the Philippine High School for the Arts and the Tourism Council.
Contact: Xavier Abelador at 0927.4065322 or 0928.4985562
Olan Gonzales comes from a long line of talented artists. He is the eighth out of 10 artistic siblings, with their mother Irene acknowledged as a master basket maker. Stories of Olan’s painting talent are legend in his hometown — from the time he painted Jesus while he was temporarily struck blind as a child, to the fine portraits and detailed architectural sketches he produces.
Gonzales was the first Ivatan to be offered a full scholarship in fine arts at UP Diliman. His works have been exhibited at the CCP and at the Headlands Center for the Arts in San Francisco. His art can also be found in many private collections, both in the Philippines and abroad, including that of Batanes Bishop Camillo Gregorio, on behalf of the Vatican. A first-place winner in the Pacita Abad Foundation’s annual contest, he has been the lead painter in the Tukon Chapel ceiling project.
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Only 19, Jaypee Portez has had his works purchased at eBay and as far away as Australia. He is currently engaged in a couple of major commissioned projects: a mosaic at the Batanes airport, and a 50-piece installation for a hotel to be built in Manila by Ricky Gutierrez, the owner of Sentro Restaurant.
Jaypee’s excellent paintings employ a unique, semi-abstract style and utilize a common motif, that of circles, which for him represent a familiar shape. He sees it often replicated in native gold earrings, the stones used for the sturdy Ivatan houses, and in the eyes of the dibang or flying fish, a staple Ivatan food.
Born in Mahatao in the main island of Batan, Jaypee spent his early years in San Pedro, Laguna, before coming back to his hometown for good. While in third grade, the child prodigy won first place in a painting competition. He was valedictorian of the Payuhuan nu Kapaypinta, the first arts training program in Batanes, and is now a leading youth arts trainer. He wishes to go to UP Diliman for fine arts, and to become a famous painter.
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Xavier Abelador is a much-sought-after representational and surrealist painter, one of the first Ivatan artists who have completed formal university training, having gained a BFA from FEATI University. While in Manila, he earned many distinctions, such as placing as a runner-up in the ArtPetron 2006 contest, a finalist in the Shell Art Competition in the same year, and a finalist in the PLDT-DPC cover design contest of 2005 and 2006.
His favorite mediums are oil and acrylic, although he also likes to dabble in watercolor, pastel, colored pencils and mixed media. He paints Batanes landscapes and seascapes in an impressionist manner, but also produces haunting imagery when he melds indigenous motifs with a mythic scale of imagination in his remarkable surreal paintings.
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Javier Ponce was raised in Itbayat, the northernmost island in the Batanes group. He began painting in grade school and honed his talent in college. He won numerous awards throughout his school years, with well-detailed works that eventually evolved into an abstract tribal style. He still does realistic art, however, preferring oil and acrylic as his primary mediums.
Javier has found a new use for the palette knife, which he says makes it much easier for him to compose colors. “I work really fast with it,” he adds. Though he will not abandon the brush, he wants to continue experimenting with his new style.
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