Angel Cacnio

Angel Cacnio: Strokes for the Folk

Text by Pam Brooke A. Casin

Along the Acacia and coconut-lined narrow and perpetually busy streets of Malabon stands a grand house that art built—one that is sprawling with healthy blooms and greens on the outside and brimming with aesthetic sensibilities of a seasoned painter on the inside. 

At the get go, one can easily hear a distinct sound and taste a definite flavor emanating from the posh mansion. (A novel this author had read reasoned that every place in the world has a unique sound and that each sound echoes the heart of a place and is linked to the essential character of its people.) To put it in a more succinct manner, ensconced in the house was an unmistaken air of nobility and comfort, of currency and history, and of subtlety and decadence—much like the temperament of the visual oeuvre of the owner.

Spacious and capriciously filled with a mish-mash of paintings from different years, 79-year-old visual artist Angel Cacnio’s house made from generous slabs of stone doubles as a museum (with dramatic light fixtures and whatnot that accentuate each of his paintings and sculptures of his sons Ferdinand and Michael) one can visit anytime. Guests are welcome to ogle at Cacnio’s body of work and may perhaps even spot the high-spirited and loquacious painter working on a new piece of, say, fishermen hauling in a day’s catch at one corner of the living room while listening to a steady and sumptuous flow of jazz and old kundiman music permeating the airy space. 

Recognized and admired for his ingenious, brilliantly colored, and realist renditions of subjects belonging to the folk genre, Cacnio however began his artistic career by painting in the modernist style. Having studied at the University of the Philippines at the time when modernism was gaining a niche in the local art circuit and having been classmates with superb patrons of modern art like famed abstract artists Jose Joya and Federico Aguilar Alcuaz, Cacnio imbibed in his early works the similar pictorial techniques of abstractionists, cubists and expressionists. Central to his works as a student were deep and somber color schemes, lines, and angles. Seemingly, his works took off from Mexican painter Rufino Tamayo’s pieces.

Like the famous Tamayo, Cacnio had always been interested in depicting the human figure and had constantly preferred painting scenes from his hometown’s everyday life. Although his early works were abstractly treated, his themes remained Filipino to the core. After sometime though, Cacnio’s paintings evolved or rather his stylistic values did—the abstract qualities were stripped off and the hues, no longer earthy but romantic and intense. The artist’s choice of subjects however stayed put. Recurring in his populous canvases are the fisherfolk of Malabon in deep thought, dynamic pictures of cockfights and dances, solemn scenes of a family in prayer before having a festive meal, and still-lives of fleshy seafood and fruits. 

But Cacnio also has had a longstanding affinity towards the historical and the epic. It was he who designed the 100 and 20 peso bills, as well as the 50 and 25-centavo mints that were first circulated sometime from 1982 to 1983. Some of his noted paintings depict heroes and historical milestones, making his large canvases seem like pages of a history book crammed with brightly hued images of, say, Apolinario Mabini’s capture, the first mass in the country, or the katipuneros’ cry for freedom from and triumph over the Spaniards. 

Oscillating from folk to historical, Cacnio’s visual language remains consistent. Based on research, on memory, or on artistic composition alone, his opuses are expressive and use the full potential of his chosen medium, as critic Alice Guillermo once opined. They are teeming with narratives rooted in tradition and culture and of everyday stories seen and gathered from around the artist’s self-effacing neighborhood. Meanwhile, Cacnio’s brushstrokes, especially in watercolor, are very fluid—light but with a measured hint of control that gives the desired effect of freshness.

The same can be said with regard to his pieces rendered in oil. Seen in his recent dabbles with the medium are seemingly intentional yet hurried flicks of paint applied in such a way to connote impressionistic touches and a melding of generous colors that set the tone or mood of a certain painting. As a result, Cacnio’s opuses become remarkable because they are able to capture a scene, a moment as if it hadn’t already passed. Critics have said that there is an innate sensitivity in Cacnio’s works—one cannot help it but to empathize with his subjects. 

As a matter of fact, Cacnio reveals that he identifies with the people, the sights and sounds, and the quaint and full-flavored relishes of Malabon the most that’s why he and his wife chose to stay and build a nice home in the city where he grew up. The imagery in the area was just too rich and pulsating to resist, he added. The tales and heritage it gives refuge to, much too significant not to be made public. The simple pleasures it gave him—the nearby palengke (market) selling the freshest produce and seafood, seeing a lone fisherman waiting patiently in his boat, or the ripples of water on a palaisdaan (fish pond)—much too poetic not to be arrested in immortal brushstrokes dipped in vivid palettes.