Provenance: Private Collection, Bacolod City

ABOUT THE WORK

A legendary expatriate Filipino artist, Romeo Tabuena chose to live and conduct his art practice in Mexico, a country that shares a handful of similarities with the Philippines, more notably in expressions of culture that reflect the Spanish colonial influence. In this work, Tabuena depicts one of the more enduring sights of his native home: cockfighting. Through a visual language that reveals a Cubist influence, Tabuena evokes the energy and ferocity of cockfighting through a flurry of shapes and colors, with the beaks of the birds fully open and feathers seemingly shooting out of this high-charged scene. Darting within a contained aura of furious activity, Tabuena’s depiction of sabong is remarkable for its beauty, intensity, and luminosity.