There is something fascinating about the works of contemporary artist Jigger Cruz. Tactile and effusive, Cruz approaches his work with something that could only be described as a “calculated defacement” as he slashes, burns, and piles his way into a work he is creating, often over a classically made piece Cruz either acquired or replicated. As such, he juxtaposes two worlds – the traditional world and the chaotic mess he overlays onto it.
\nHis Trinitarian Formula: Great Corners Through the Eyes of the Moths takes Cruz’s usual concept and puts it onto a bigger and wider canvas. A story done in three parts, Cruz’s streamof-consciousness scribbles travel across three canvases, their trails disconnected but evident as they cover up the paintings done underneath his scribbles. Once a canvas boasting of classical paintings, one can no longer recognize the image beneath though they know that the image was there. The edges of the frames are pockmarked with holes as though riddled with bullets or eaten away by moths and mites.
\nIn the Christian doctrine, the Trinity refers to the nature of God as the Father, God as the Son, and God as the Holy Spirit, three distinct persons sharing one essence. As is with the Trinity’s oneness despite its distinctive personalities and separate roles in the heavenly and worldly realms, Cruz’s Trinitarian Formula is viewed as one bonded through three separate beings. As though proving that, one singular line of red paint travels from the leftmost painting toward the rightmost piece before it fizzles out into the background.
\nThe works of Jigger Cruz evoke such a visceral and vital reaction through their ‘defacement’ of classical pieces, whether it be through his historical or religious pieces. Though his thick, impasto scribbles cover the painting underneath, one cannot help but reconstruct the hidden image beneath, a testament to how deep the traditions of Western traditional painting run even in a country across the world.
\n“One need not be born into a European or Americal cultural setting to be amply exposed to the contours and obsession of the Western aesthetic discourse,” wrote Nemerofsky Ramsay.
\nThe works behind Cruz’s Trinitarian Formula are barely recognizable and yet, one cannot help but try to decipher it. Perhaps one could see the winding dirt road Christ traveled himself or the summit of a mountain similar to that in Gethsemane. No matter how thick Cruz’s scribbles may be, even just a glimpse of the painting behind sends its viewers into overdrive as they try to identify it. With Trinitarian Formula, Cruz speaks of the inevitability and permanence of religion within Philippine culture, easily identified despite being under a ton of distractions and redirections.
\nCruz’s works put into the forefront both the state of the world as he sees it and the ambiguous questions and answers he brought up. “There is a captivating ambiguity as to whether his interventions bring us closer to the truth…or if they take us further away,” Nemerofsky Ramsay said. Indeed, his works bring up a mirage of both conceptual and theoretical questionings as discourses of religion, history, and art take center stage. The language of graffiti and vandalism is brought into the mainstream, framing Cruz’s historical and cultural prodding in a different light and making Cruz’s oeuvre one of the most intellectually stimulating in Philippine art history. (Hannah Valiente)
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