Lot description
Mauro Malang Santos (1928 - 2017) Banana Series signed and dated 1978 (lower right) gouache on paper 40" x 60" (102 cm x 152 cm) León Gallery wishes to thank the West Gallery for confirming the authenticity of this lot Mauro Malang Santos' Banana Series counts among the largest works by the artist to enter the Philippine art market. But beyond this impressive feat lies a kind of technical brilliance that Malang's paintings of plants and trees cheerfully exemplify. Malang's plants and trees sprouted on his canvas in the mid-1970s as a natural progression and elevation from the themes that had populated his art in the years prior. Previously, Malang had only relegated these lush vegetations in the background to support the integrity of the focal subject; they serve as enhancements for the landscapes of bustling barrios and busy towns, portraits of women vendors, and rows of ordinary houses, but are now the protagonists and "movers" of the composition. "Malang's obsessive urge to work in 'series' is probably dictated by the need for a visual fulcrum on which to anchor his ideas. In the Plants and Trees paintings, he has found an image worthy of his rich imaginings," writes in the catalog of his 1981 exhibition at the Museum of Philippine Art. This 1978 piece titled Banana Series captures Malang's invigorating pursuit to reanimate his creative play on figure-ground relationships and their playful interaction within the space of the composition. As Edilberto B. Bravo puts it in the book Hidden Treasures, Simple Pleasures, "urban shanties in signature Malang style become the background for this glorious rendering of a banana tree." The banana tree (an herbaceous flowering plant if one considers scientific accuracy)—with its gigantic, lush leaves rendered in Malang's trademark angular shapes and its luxuriant fruits and flowers signifying its sound growth and the fertility of the soil—serves as the most crucial element in the composition. While the background is permeated with a homogenous blue sky and crammed with monochromatic barong-barongs, the banana tree is highly distinguishable from the rest of the canvas due to its graphic depiction, effectively drawing the line between subject and background and veering the viewer's focus into the tree's radiant and varying colors. Thus, Malang's intention to elevate his plants and trees into the protagonist of his works during the mid to late 1970s is made evident. Furthermore, by situating a lofty and fruitful banana tree in the middle of the slums, Malang injects into a rather depressing subject an inherent optimism that immensely speaks of his gleeful disposition in life. "I guess I just happen to be one of the more fortunate ones," Malang said to Cid Reyes when interviewed in June 1985. “Siguro [dahil] masasaya ang kulay ko [Maybe because my colors speak of joy]. (Adrian Maranan)
