SAINT SEBASTIAN
Oil on
cradled canvas
6’ x 4’
April 15 –
May 22, 2022
I
envisioned Saint Sebastian against a Nature setting, specifically the outskirts
of Marawi City, beside Lake Lanao, and then deconstructed the martyrdom episode.
If Christians were martyred for their faith, could not non-Christians have been
killed for their own faith too? Christians did do that to non-Christians in the
past, and continue to do so. Most Christians today may no longer actually murder
heathen by race, color, and creed, but they consistently practice
discrimination against them—in their recruitment for jobs, in their preference
for neighbors and friends, and in extending help and charity only to their own
kind.
This
painting commenced during Ramadan of 2022. In this painting there is a
reference to the lumad who were massacred by Christian soldiers in the south. I
made Sebastian one such lumad from Mindanao. A sacred torogan is in the
distance, and a mosque in the far distance. Sebastian is tied to a ficus tree
in full bloom with golden-yellow berries at the peak of summer. This is the
same tree that grows outside M.’s café, before we had it trimmed in preparation for the onset of the rainy season. The mayana
plants in the foreground, typically roadside plants, are those in our roof deck
garden.
The
auditory stimulus I used while making this painting is at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPX7NDsKQks.
Do listen to it while viewing the work.
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