ABOUT THE WORK

At least four swirling ballerinas with their arms raised with curvilinear grace, embody Edgar Degas’ sensibility to the fluid nuances of ballet’s illusory language of expression. In many ways, the ballet studio wall mirror is the dancer’s counterpart of a canvas on easel; or a block of wood to be worked on by the sculptor; the problems to be solved on the two planes have remarkable similarities, and those likenesses begin to explain why the moving figure has been so attractive to artists and sculptors as far back as art historian care to go. The dancer strives to deliver movement to the intuition, that amazing facility that will assimilate and economize motion. The mind is left free for interpretive coloration to project the dancer’s style. The dancers moving in space take on the challenges of the sculptor; the dancer adding theatrical values and the dimension of human relationships in dramatic situations. The sculpture in shallow relief is more romantic than classical in sensibility, what with the outstretched poses. Castrillo, a vanguard of modernism in Philippine sculpture, synthesizes the contours of his subjects, achieving a unity of essential form. The latter 1960s saw the emergence of Castrillo as the main force to reckon with after Abueva in the field of sculpture, yet throughout his career, he rarely worked on wood. “I’ve worked with wood but not that much. One of my sculptures – they say it’s one of my best ones – is something that I did for the Don Bosco Chapel in Makati. It’s made of bronze and wood. It’s a religious piece, an impressionist Christ.” – Eduardo Castrillo