The Banggaan Letters (2)

Girl in a Makati bar by Ben Razon

Continuing what should have been private conversations (again, the names have changed to preserve the privacy of paticipants), but which turn out to be, well, celebrations. Here are further discussions about things important to us (and to most of our readers hopefully)—mainly art and the creation of beauty amid all that seeks to undermine it, and our perception of an imperfect world. But even then, there is a place for simple joy, like friends in the Banggaan e-group who correspond mainly in the virtual world of the Web, but when they meet in the flesh are simply like… warm human beings (warts, cameras, and all), or even like children all over again…

Post No. 8: "Taninang art yan... kailangan pa ba yan?"

salamat marne. di ko akalaing sagutin mo ng ganyan ka passionate ang tanong ko.

ang problema ko lang ay mahina ang prossesor ko kaya paumanhin kung hanggang ngayon ay iniisip ko pa din ang ilang ibig sabihin ng mga sinabi mo.

pero sa tingin ko natumbok mo ang ibig kong sabihin. siguro nagiging 'offensive' ang isang bagay kung bago ito sa kanya. gaya nga ng mga impressionists at lahat ng mga 'artists' (kasama lahat dyan... poets, photogs etc) na nagiging prominente. sa umpisa ay considered as 'offensive' ang kanilang sining. pero oras na maintindihan ay nawawala na ang pagka 'offensive' nito at nagiging natural na lamang.

actually ang purpose ng karamihang artists ay not to offend but to open up minds to new thinking at yan siguro ang dahilan kung bakit na-ooffend ang iba. masyado nang nakapako sa established beliefs kaya sila naninibago.

agree ako don sa sinabi mo na 'art' cannot change kahit gaano pa ka 'offensive' ito. sabi nga ng kasamako dito... 'tang-inang art yan... kailangan pa ba yan? armed revolution na!' haha.

salamat.
gelo

Post No.9: "...Talaga... but art can only save the soul"

Oo nga, Gelo,

"Tanginang art talaga iyan!" Armed revolution na nga lang. Well, tingin ko ulit, armed revolutions can save nations (from oppressive governments or invaders, etc.), but art can only save the soul (and the soul of a nation...)

Marne


One more Batang Ulingan, by Ben Razon


[Junsy, another Banggaan stalwart, conducts a photography seminar in his home state in the U.S. and posts about the experience.]

Post No.10: “Photogrpahers have no friends…”

Junsy,



There's not much else for me to add to your account of how you've
 presented photography to people who were obviously hungry to see what
was beyond just having the latest digital camera or software.



Banggaan has been around for nearly ten years now, and I have to say
that this is the one and only forum where I have stayed and engaged
the input of not just from photographers like me, Claro and Joga, but
it has been so valuable a sounding board that we exchange, speak or
verify our views in the broader arena of all our combined fields,
experience and outlook.



That's why I'll be the first one to say that the reason why I never 
participate in forums of just photography is that, to be honest —I 
have nothing to say to these people. I really cannot prejudge or size
up any kind of fair analysis or critique or advise to anyone who is
trying to do the same thing I'm doing, although we could still be many
levels different from both background and orientation towards 
photography.



Because like what Marne said, i think it's too limited for an artist
 or photographer to just base his or her work in their respective but
limited spectrum rather than being able to throw your work out there
to be seen and judged by others who are not artists or photographers.



People don't even realize that my influences don't even come from
 other photographers' work but more from my reading, writing, music,
and how I appreciate art from my level.



In fact, I hate photography in how it tries to be art and the things
it was never meant to be or was, which is so outside of its inherent
nature as simply a visual document produced by a person holding a
machine. Unless it's clear that what I see in photographs are a 
person's vision or their stamp, pictures are basically not much of 
interest to me.



If fact I don't even like photographers themselves. Most of them
anyway. Except of course, the ones I've nominated and asked to join 
Banggaan. The rest of them, especially here are just a bunch of
self-obsessed egomaniacs, poseurs, self-serving manipulators, and 
idiots and I really don't give a shit what they do.



I'm not going to name names, but they know who they are.



Photography has no friends, unlike the way the world of Art has. That
may be a bit puzzling or hard to get at first, but when you've been a 
photographer like I have all my life, I know. You don't have to take
 my word for it, but experience has been my best counsel there. I've
led a solitary life as one. I've even dismissed and set aside a normal
life with a wife and kids for the purpose of just being able to shoot 
and live the way I do. And I count whom I consider my colleagues here
 and abroad with just the fingers of one hand.


It's just that I engage myself in other things when I don't have to
 shoot. And I only carry my camera with me when I either actually OWN a
 camera I can carry, or I've thought that there'd be a picture there.



But other than that—please. Nothing bores me more than 
photographers or people talking about their work or themselves. It's
like, yuk. I'm more interested in what other people do, what man 
basically creates, what they are more or less and those places they
thrive in. And that's the purpose the pictures have served for me.



Aren't we all as artists and photographers eternally curious about
 what else is going on in the world? Photography has been my only way
 to get outside of myself. It afforded me a different way to live and
 see rather than just plain, boring 'existing'.



And it has given me friends who come from completely different walks
of life who are far more interesting and worthwhile, and I love and
 treasure those relationships more than I would ever keep going on
about me as a 'photographer' or 'letratista' or 'maniniyut' or a
 'kodakero'. And many of those people are right here in this forum of 
Banggaan. I would drop everything including my camera to spend time 
with them rather than waste time discussing or debating idiots or 
beginners.



I'm rambling like Marne, but what he wrote is pretty much the
 description of the path I took, too.

Ben :-)

Sta. Rita, Pampanga, by Ben Razon

❝

Interlude:

Virtual friends become real...

In a recent Banggaan "reunion," "Banggers" (most of whom know each other only by email) met each other in the flesh. At Oarhouse bar on Mabini Street in Ermita, homecoming artist Edd Aragon, after an absence of some 30 years, I understand, launched the first of his Tres Kantos exhibit: Digitalla Prima (his digital artworks) at Oarhouse. The two other exhibits on the next two Sundays were Mulat! (of his "invisible" or UV-reactive paintings), at Heber Bartolome's Art Center in Banlat, Tandang Sora; and Opp-Edd (his digital editorial cartoons for the Sydney Morning Herald), at Maestro, Masterpiece Art Depot, on E. Rodriguez, QC. That same Sunday, it turned out, was also Ben Razon's birthday, so it was a double celebration. Ben presides over Oarhouse, the unofficial blocks-and-cement headquarters of Banggaan. I was able to go with my home partner Pam to only the first of EddA's exhibits at Oarhouse, and met there, outside of email, another homecoming photographer Tante Tagamolila, and CNN China head Jaime Flor Cruz with whom I had something in common apart Banggaan, a friend also formerly of China, the writer Mario Miclat. But all of us, even before the benisons of San Miguel, seemed like old friends, courtesy of the magic of the e-group and, now, the half-vritual, half-real friendship in the Net. And here, too, below and next page, are, inevitably some of the million photos taken...

THE GANG: Our Muse, writer Sylvia Mayuga, Heber, Claro, Benjo, Tante, David, Marne, Bodyi, Glenn, Edd, Jonet, and Ben. A traffic-stopping bunch (maybe for a minute...until the honking started).