The saints are down

The next time you see the painter Dante Perez, you might not recognize him; they shaved his hardy beard and moustache to put in the respirator in the last hours, after he was rushed to ICU and said hello to his kids and drew a funny drawing and said, “Sparkle!”, maybe the soft drink, late on black Tuesday that also had National Artist filmmaker Eddie Romero packing up, time to go.

So you see requiems might be all we’re good for, but a month ago it wasn’t too bad, Dante up and about and excited during the opening of his show at Art Informal along Connecticut, San Juan, “Lithium” it was called and where I managed to take some pictures of the works near the entrance/exit, plastic cup of Jim Beam or what could be Jim Beam in hand, in order of appearance: ‘The saints are down,” title painting “Lithium,” and “Temples.” At the time of viewing we never dreamt it would be a swan song of sorts, or a sparkle of a song.

He had an already opened mat of Mogs, saying it was good to sleep with, and thinking back now maybe he did look a bit haggard, maybe stressed with the preparation for the medium and large scale works of oil, acrylic, mixed media and industrial paint, as well as a video installation titled “My heart lies still at the bottom of the lake.”

In his later years, i.e., his 50s, he had gradually moved toward filmmaking and acting, doing the semi-documentary on the actor Soliman Cruz, and taking supporting roles in a number of Lav Diaz epics and non-epics, including the 60-minute Butterflies Have No Memories, such that Soliman would say, “Hayup  ‘tong si Dante, aagawan pa ko ng trabaho” (This guy is depriving me of work).

The painter even appeared in some mainstream productions, with bit roles in a horror movie but showbiz was not cut out for him, or is it the other way around, besides hindi niya kaya ang mga hours, couldn’t handle the weird schedules.

But it was to his art which he regularly returned for a kind of creative, spiritual sustenance, holding at least one major show at times with a young artist every year, at the refurbished Penguin with the shisha, at Oarhouse with the long port side bar, and Art Informal where dusk gradually took over nakakadilim ng paningin, and where the girls, well, napaglilihian — they fed one’s cravings.

The guy certainly owns pride of place in the apartment, with separate works in two sections of the unit, “Apocrypha” above the piano beside Tence Ruiz’s “Postmoderne,” “Petrified hope” in the living room above the TV.

“Petrified” is from 2004 and which I picked up after his one-man exhibit at Alliance Française or in that building across it in Reposo, while Apocrypha is from 2010 personally delivered by the painter himself to the apartment, like Tence did his, more than blood brothers in the painter’s art. I wished to tell him he shouldn’t have died yet at 56, not when 2016 is a good three years away and during which I expected another painting from him to complete the trilogy done in presidential election years.

Between “Apocrypha” and “Petrified” was storm Ondoy in 2009, which nearly wiped out the family homestead in Tandang Sora, same year his wife Madeleine died of cancer, such that the artist said, “Parang akong nahubaran,” it was as if he were stripped bare, but his work developed an edge having been granted a second lease after all the trials and tribulations.

There’s also that print sent down south called “Infidel,” another of the surreal portraits, and the watercolor “I know what you’re thinking,” on bond paper with a coffee spill-like image of a cow.

And the Oarhouse T-shirt designed by Dante, which I passed to my son, of people looking toward the back of a bus. At Oar somewhere is the painting of the beetle and miniature soccer player doing a spectacular acrobatic kick and omnipresent stampita, found images on canvas, to keep you company while downing the nth pares of Negra and Pale. 

To say that we go back a long way is an understatement, those Jingle days along 7th Avenue Cubao corner P. Tuason, drinking sessions in the corner sari-sari stores or psychedelic substances in the music room listening to the latest from The Band, why, didn’t Tedan resemble one of the members of Bob Dylan’s famed backup, Rick Danko or Richard Manuel or Robbie Robertson, he fit the bill, blended in with “The night they drove old Dixie down.”

Which night was a dark one. And the painter whistling in the wind in the sudden company of Sir Eddie, who until a month ago was still attending screenings of the Cinema Evaluation Board, his critical eye never blurred, the handwritten comments never faltered.

The last screening he attended, the National Artist felt strongly about one of the local soaps that he said shouldn’t get a grade, and that if it did he would resign.

Just as he said, when asked if people have different conceptions of art after an Ai Ai delas Alas movie took the top prize at a film fest, “That’s the excuse of those who don’t know anything about art,” followed up by “Maybe we should all resign in protest.”

 When I asked the director, who rarely went back to his hometown Dumaguete in recent years, if he was going home because the workshop was about to start in the summer, he waved me off, saying “I hate workshops.”

 The rest of us in the board barely had an inkling he would go so quickly, at 88 still the master of dissimulation, although he had started to move slowly, was having difficulty finishing the modest buffet or packed lunch before the irregular Tuesday screenings. But up to the last his nurse would accompany him to the after meal smoke and coffee downstairs at his favorite Figaro.

So if it’s any consolation, Dante went in good company, the painter and the National Artist for Film, both of whose passing dealt a double whammy to art late in the not so merry month of May. We’ll miss Sir Eddie’s silent demeanor and sharp comments, and Dante’s humor and convivial company over booze and such, and never forget the time he delivered pinangat and laing straight from his beloved Bicol to our doorstep in Mandaluyong, to alert us on an upcoming show, how were we to know it was nearing the end of his dark life.