1980 / Oil on canvas / 199 x 199 cm / Artist: Mauro Malang Santos aka Malang / Cultural Center of the Philippines collection

This work shows Malang’s highly original approach to figurative painting. Here the pictorial space is dominated by a large plant that stands in the midst of an urban landscape, occupying the lower fifth section of the field. The influence of cubism is seen in the simplified, geometricizing treatment of the city structures.

The plant itself spreads out over the entire space. It has a vigorous, spiky character—its large leaves luminous in white and ocher tones, its bladelike edges signifying burgeoning organic growth that is reinforced by the vertical and diagonal rhythms of the supporting stems or stalks in a cluster of cubist influence. The planes and facets are large and of petallike fineness in texture; contrast is created with smaller curvilinear shapes, between the petallike stamens and pistils of a gigantic bloom. A sense of liveness is conveyed by the various tones of green, ocher, and white modulating in various intensities and with effects of transparency. The flowering plant stands tall against a neutral sky, which is also the ground for the dominant figure. The artist sees to it, however, that the sky is not mere empty void; random marks and inflections, as well as modulations of tone, give it a presence of its own, at the same time it serves to bring out the vitality of the organic plant form.