 How are you doing? Welcome to this presentation of Kultura Sining at Ibapá, a project of TV UP of the University of the Philippines. Today we have a very interesting presentation of a massive project being undertaken by the Cultural Center of the Philippines. And to help me with the hosting is my good friend and fellow writer, the director of the University of the Philippines Press, Professor Neil Garcia. Neil, I think you'd like to introduce our guests for today. Yes, our guests for today are the editor-in-chief of the C.C. Pinsaclopedia of Philippine Art and also a selection of the volume editors. We begin with one of the volume editors for the broadcast communication volume, Professor Betsy Enriquez and Professor Eli Guep, both from the College of Mass Communication of UP de Limán. And on the other side, we have Professor Apuchua, who is editing the volume on Philippine Theater, and Professor Cecile de la Paz, who is editing the volume on Philippine visual art. And we have also Chris Miliado of the C.C.P., an artistic director of the C.C.P. And he's a techie and he will also talk about some of the digital aspects of this undertaking. And of course, this whole project is managed and overseen by Professor Yes, of course. I saved the best for last. The editor-in-chief, Dr. Professor Emeritus Nick Tiongson of the College of Mass Communication. We're so happy to have him here for this show. So we're looking forward to the discussion. Yes. And Nick also was the former vice president and artistic director of the Cultural Center of the Philippines shortly after EDSA. So Nick oversaw many of the changes that took place in the C.C.P. This is a revolution of the C.C.P. under Nick. And we all remember that. Actually, the first question has to do with probably just the definition of terms. What is the C.C.P. Encyclopedia of Philippine Art? Well, it's a compilation actually of cultural data about the country. It was first conceived in 1990. The C.C.P. then defined its vision as a national culture that is evolving with and for the people. And to be able to get there, we thought that it would be important to, first of all, raise the cultural consciousness of the people all over the archipelago and also to encourage the creation of regional Filipino works. In the first aspect, which is development of the national cultural consciousness, that's where this came in. We felt that at that time, actually, after EDSA, there was a lot of questions from embassies abroad, because people were curious about the country, but they had no materials to give. So this evolved actually together with Tuklasini also to be able to answer that need abroad. So we started this in 1990. The gathering of data actually started much earlier for Tuklasini. And then Tuklasini evolved into the insect. But before this, there was no such comprehensive encyclopedia of Philippine art? No. Actually, there was one. You remember Galang, right? So Galang, head encyclopedia. So it has volumes like this. And this is contemporary modern art. This was the first edition came out in 1994. It had 10 volumes. So two volumes on the peoples of the Philippines and their arts. And then the seven volumes on each of the arts, so architecture, visual arts, music, dance, theater, film, literature, and then an index. Now it's going to be much larger. How many volumes this time? These 12 volumes already. So we have, because it's been more than 20 years, so we need to update and revise. It's a continuing process. Even this edition that's coming out is a work in progress. So we have now three volumes on peoples of the Philippines. Then one volume each on architecture, visual arts, music, dance, theater, film, literature now has two volumes. And we have a new volume on broadcast arts. I think that's a very new thing. So that would be 12 volumes. And the average number of pages per volume now is about 650. So these are the big volumes more than double the first ones. So clearly, like I said in the intro, this is a massive project. 12 volumes, and damning lalaman. But I want to return to you the reason why this is needed. You mentioned earlier that national, cultural consciousness. Why is that important? The editorial vision for the whole project. Well, the whole idea is, we know with our colonial experience, the tendency of the Filipino to be like the ones who are left behind in their own religion, who are left behind in their own culture. And a lot of this is because they don't know the achievements of their life. There are so many of them. But where will you find them? The teachers who teach cultures in high school, or when they say, I hope you will find them. Will I go to the book to research? We need a source. Go to source, yeah. So the scholar is the writer, but very, very readable. Organized the data. So immediately, if he needs to research in one reading, you know that, he will teach that to the child. He will not be an expert there, but he will have basic data. And our sect in the nation will partly come from that. The cultural memory. We know what we are doing. We know the achievements of our artists. And you will change your perspective. You will not leave the country. Because you really will not leave. Because it is evidence that he really did a good job. So that is the national cultural consciousness that we want to evolve through the encyclopedia. And also for the artists there, because we also want to encourage artists to expose their data to ethnic groups. So when you choose them, they also have a background in the different sources of their ideas. Because we tend to be urban centric. And also American centric. So how will you become a Filipino? Are the entries in Filipino or in English? In English first. What made you decide on that? If the imperative is national consciousness, we do have a national language. It's called Filipino. And the language of the encyclopedia is not Filipino but English. So that's a discrepancy, isn't it? It is a discrepancy. And I'm sorry about that. It's one of the limitations of the encyclopedia. Although we want to reach out to the broadest sectors of our people. It has to be in English. Why does it have to be in English? I think it's English first. But I hope it will be in English. Because the problem is, most of the writers really write in English. Only a few are able to handle Filipino for this purpose. So if I wait for all of this to come true, then the data will also pass. So what I feel is that we will release the data first. And then let's really seriously think about how we will all write in Filipino. Maybe this should just be explained in the introduction. Because I'm also thinking another way to approach that is to claim English as a national language too. So in fact, it unifies us in the way that Filipino does. And around north to south of the archipelago, English is understood, right? So it is our national language as well. I have a question. I have a question. Chris, why can't you just google it? There are a lot of people. I will add one more exciting feature of this updated edition. The online version. You go to a website that is specifically customized and designed for the content of the encyclopedia. And the worldwide web can access the content online. It's not open access though. It's still for pay. No, that's the wonderful thing. It's going to be free for all public schools, state colleges, and universities. In the Philippines. But let's say you're not in the Philippines. Then there's going to be a very low subscription, free, premium, that will be competitive with very popular spots like Spotify, for example. One that killed the print version. I mean, who would like to buy the print version? Well, we did a market study. And the print version is being, we get pre-orders from its education institutions, libraries, and collectors. And early at this point, when we're speaking, there are a lot of reservations for the print version. There are still institutions and even individuals who prefer to have the hard copies of encyclopedia. Except if we only have hard copies, then we need your books every year to update. If it's online, you just keep updating. And that date can be real-time. The minute you have a correction, you can actually upload it. Exactly. That is one of the features of the online version. Besides being updatable every six months, it even has more content. Because this time, we don't have to be very selective and limited about our choice of photographs, for example. So more images could be uploaded. You can have video clips and things like that. Video clips, audio clips, interactive portions. And even we can even customize content, like specifically for high school teachers. And it's all searchable. We don't need anything else. Yes, exactly. So it's much, much... Well, it's going to be very powerful and the reach will also expand exponentially. At the same time, we're going to have an app version for mobile devices. So it'll make it very accessible. Will the launch date for the online or app version be the same as the launch for the print? Yes. In fact, it's the first development of the online version. Oh, long. So the online version is going to wait for the launch of the print. And then you want to release it at the same time. Now, there's a third iteration of the encyclopedia. And we call this a digital table. So imagine a table like this. It's set up on the wall. It's highly interactive. You can move around content. And it's going to be situated this time on site at the CCP main theater lobby. It will contain the same content as the print and the updated version online. What this does is it interacts and engages with what is going on in the live performances at the CCP. So for example, I step in. I'm going to watch a Sarsuela. I can search before stepping into the theater. I search for that content about the Sarsuela. I can see other related content before I step into the theater. So to a certain degree, it really enhances the watching of the live performance, increases the knowledge base for that specific event. That's lovely. Oh, it's very promising. It's very promising. I'm still interested in the work that's going on here. When I asked you if you can google it, I thought that if I'm a consumer, I'd like to know if it's good or bad. I didn't google it. Why did I go to the encyclopedia? But you said that in putting this together, you embedded a certain consciousness into it. What was it? I'm sure you believe in it. How do you think it's possible that this wrong thing is embedded in the encyclopedia? We actually had a question. Did you follow a template, for example, in the crafting of each entry? And what quality controls did you put in place in the researching? For the last three years, I've been interested in the three years of crafting and every one month, we haven't lost anything. I think the editor-in-chief and the volume editors were able to fix all these requirements so that the entries would be even out and the entries would be the same. There are templates. And in the 1994 edition, I was able to stop the details of the entries. The scholarship was the most exciting thing. That's what I thought. Can you explain a little more? What are the scholarships? Scholarly publications on the field. For example, in theater volume, for the first time, you can access theater students on 61 titles. Readings of them. What are they? Summaries. And entries. Of existing scholarship in the area. So for the first time, for the theater field, we have 61 titles and they are more reading. These are 61 books on theater studies. Books and publications. And other publications. That's true. The visual arts volume has a list of scholarly titles on visual arts. We have an essay for art scholarly works. But I think it will take another volume to tease out all those scholarships. But what we did here was to understand the definition of art itself when you talk of Philippine art. Historically, we went beyond definitely prehistoric times with the connection with Austronesia and then delving into the contemporary art issues and its connection with globalization and transnational issues. Is that a new feature compared to the former volume? Yes. We also have a volume to limit the definition of art. But because art scholars and art critics this time around gave answers so there is a refinement in art historiography itself. There is an increase of art criticism in art works and the definition of art forms to include traditional arts as living traditions even the art works that we did not recognize like effigies which played a lot during the martial law period are now part of the Bocchi Boccavillari of Philippine art. Because it became important in a particular way because the Philippines is really a science. For that alone I think our women in the Philippines are not just in the art world but also in the art world that is alive. Speaking of new art forms I think broadcast is a new addition to the encyclopedia. How can you justify Betsy's broadcasting as an art form in itself? It is difficult to justify because a lot of it is related to broadcasting as a scene. That is why we invited Ely because she gave the broadcasting to the CCP and recognized as an art form. We can debate until tomorrow whether it is really art or not. Because she said in our daily life on radio, on TV in truth you taught me a millennial that is not in contact with some kind of electronic medium at any given time of day or night there are no cell phones there are no broadcasts in your opinion and encompasses all of that. All of it is form of media. So in a way media. Broadcast is traditional but we define it in such a way that we we appropriate I'm just curious because it seems the visual arts volume had its own perspective and the theater arts had its own. There will be an introduction by the volume editors of the philosophy behind that volume. Yes, definitely. Because I'm thinking that there is a positive criticism here about and so your writers probably also had to do some criticism of the works not just sort of source the existing criticism and organize them and summarize them but actually to undertake the criticism. Is there a uniformity to the critical perspective that was adopted? Is it just formalism? Is it more historiographical? Is it more cultural studies? I'm just thinking of all the section editors. Maybe one of the ones that was united in other volumes is the articulation of the country. The concept of the meaning is the articulation of the country. It's a very important part. And so what medium or what expression we can look at, we can say the articulation of the country. All of them are articulations of the country. That's why you have to choose and the conversation of the country is a need to talk about the meaning. That's why this is one of the views of the volume editors. How do we look at the meaning of the country, the meaning of the country simultaneously. So in the view of our historiography and history of the country and history of the country the history of the meaning is where we are where we are. You have a general introduction per volume and it's a critical treatise in a way. That's what it is. And you use globalization, transnationalism, or diasporic. This is what the editors talk about. It's lovely. I'm sure it's important and I'll read it. There's a lot of I feel like the two projects have empirical meaning data and theoretical somewhat. Because particularly in the Philippines literacy is relatively new like 100 years of literacy. It's very preliminary. We need to sort of clarify things and come up with a theory. It's inevitable. But the next question is, quality control for the level of the pros. There's a lot of guidelines here on the home side. The readability is very important. We really think of it as high school, first-year college, second-year college. That's the target. The technical errors and the so on. If you have a theory just put it in practice. Don't make it too complicated. Because your insight because of that theory can be communicated in a way that can understand the child. So what's the age of your ideal reader? High school. Third, fourth-year high school. First, second-year college. That's the idea. So inevitably, when you fill this up, you have a return. You can tell us some stories of what you did here. My question has to do with, this is a canon in a way. What considerations do you have when you selected entries? Because you're actually making a canon. So there might be names that you would end up excluding. We were really very conscious of that. What's going to happen? Gatekeeping? Defining who is supposed to be and that. Anyway, the general orientation was this. The approach is pluralistic. In other words, all of the cultures we know we veered away from the idea of high art, low art, pop art, classical art. Inclusive of all forms. So that's very, very open already. Gender-sensitive. That's another guideline. So we have my husband's lover as an entry because it's an important breakthrough in the naanam. It celebrates all cultural traditions that we have. The ethnic, lowland cultures, the urbanized cultures and art works of all classes. So that's the illustrator art of the 19th century. But at the same time, that's the theater of labor groups. In other words, the guideline is inclusive. There's a checklist. We don't want that to happen. It's dangerous when I say that these are important writers. All of them are writers. Right? You're probably going to mention writers, but then only certain writers will have entries. So how did you decide on that? Because that's a kind of pecking order too. The selection of those who work in the sali and so on, your perspective is this is a temporary thing. In other words, it's an influx. In other words, our identity is not fixed. So the entries are like this. That's the general guideline. But for every art form, it has specificities. So I should ask them for their own volumes. For the theater, for the theater volumes, the regions are very exciting. We have representation from Mindanao, Bicol, Baguio, Visayas and of course, the Metro Manila. That perspective is very beautiful. The whole country is like that. There are a lot of entries from the artists of theater. There are a lot of practitioners. There are a lot of literature. There are a lot of literature. Two volumes of literature. It's two volumes. The most important thing would be not only the individual that is recognized as an artist, but also the collectives, art organizations that are given in the list of artists of the Philippines. So I will cite, for example, in visual arts, the time when Marshall and NPAA they only exist in a progressive way. Artists and architects of something. But when you look at their identity and their background in the history of Marshall, they are really big. They have an entry to Encyclopedia. And other groups that are also like this, and their contribution is also big now. The idea of Henio is a bit old. Because we are building an icon. But this time, it's like you're broadening it. Because we are teaching to our readers that art production is not necessarily done by a person. And that's a good lesson that we need to impart in the next generation. Collaborative. Did you try to be largely factual or inevitable critical evaluation? That's what I was asking, yes. And how did you manage that? In the broadcast, we also conducted workshops among the faculty, for example, of the Department of Broadcast Communication. We talked about who and what program should be included in the volume. Of course, the length of the list, and then eventually we had a list A, list B, list C. But eventually, we decided that the availability of the data is the problem in broadcasting. This is the youngest scene if we think about it. Radio is not even 100 years old. Not even in the West. It's just approaching its 100th year. We had television only after the World War, 1953 was the first time we had television. So the time is still short to be able to record. And another problem is the lack of data. Because it doesn't archive radio and television stations. So the problem is the search of data. And sometimes, even if we think there is an interesting program, for example, we are not included because we don't have data. But we also try Isn't memory, isn't oral memory enough? Your actual writers or resource persons can be the source of the data. Yes, we did that. There is a lot of primary research here. There are a lot, especially for that. Yes, there are a lot. But those primary sources will also get involved. They are also dying off. Exactly. We also tried very hard to get the regions. Because the regions are underrepresented. But we also had a hard time because they didn't hide the data. Especially for them. And we didn't know everything. So we also depended on our networks to find the places to contribute. How thick is this volume on broadcast? Not as thick as the slimmer volume. The other volumes. We are just starting. But hopefully it will become thicker as time goes on. And also, we could add to the data. Admittedly, the data is really lacking. But Elia and I are very proud of the fact that we were able to show the role of broadcasting. Particularly during very difficult times. Yes, during the while. We don't know how much to learn. This is one of the scholarships that Apo mentioned earlier. There are still a few of us who are writing about broadcasting. The study of broadcasting from a very critical perspective. So it's still thin. But we have changed what we see. What would be the important part of the radio and television and the important part of our history. How to use the radio in terms of colonialism, for example, in the time of the Americans, in the time of the Japanese. And also, the big role in fighting the dictatorship in the time when our country fought Marcos and Marshall. We are very important. You answer the question about the critical judgment that was embedded in my work. But what you want to add that became a part of the critical judgment is the search for information. One of the data that came to us, particularly from the regions, was that we left here because there was a chance. Because we always ask the broadcasters themselves to stop the information. Even though this is in the CCP, this is what we have been trying to do. How do you enter the intro? We are trying to enter the practical issues in the evaluation of things. So let's call it that. Even though we are trying to find things that we think are highly theoretical but practical issues will inform those critical practices. Okay. Another is the awards. Okay. We use it first. But in the West, it is not a big indicator of the choice of an actor or a work or an artist. Especially in a context that has a lot of awards. We can say what kind of award it is. A popularity award or a critical perspective. I hope you have an entry on awards and maybe an unpacking of the awards culture. You are a national artist. Yes. One of the broadcasters in particular is the turning points or the pivots. In terms of formalistic approaches, we will criticize negatively. But because it has a contribution in that genre or in the aspect of broadcasting, it is one of the contributions in acting although negatively if the formalist is strictly formalist. So others might think, oops, how did you get in? But if you look at the form that he created, although it is not possible to experiment with the production team, in our evaluation, in our situation now, he is the winner. He did not recognize it, but you will see that he started the style or genre. It is one of the lenses that we have seen. Is it okay to ask the volume editors who has the longest entry in your volume? The national artists for theaters would longer than that. For theaters that is five pages. Everybody else is fewer than that. So there is a point of reference and then everyone is reckoned against that. It's funny. Actually I have a question for Nick. You've seen the volumes, you've read the volumes. What are you proudest about in the history of our art? What are you least happy about? Condemning. To be proud about. Just choose one. What are you proudest about? And then what are you least happy about? Because you've seen it. I don't think the other volume editors have seen it the way you have, right? I'm very, very proud of the fact that the concept of art here is very democratic. We all know what it's like here. And here in this volume, especially in the peoples, we were able to get the participation of scholars from the groups themselves. The indigenous people. In other words, there is a perspective of intrinsic. We are not the only ones who say this is important. They have an input when it comes to their culture what is important. And the number of peoples has increased now. Who is the volume editor for the peoples? Do you have an anthropologist? Cary Lucero. Cary is the queen of regional literature, right? I was hoping she'd be here. She also knows all these people. I'm very grateful that Cary really contributed so much. Anyway, what I'm not happy about is the limitation of scholarship that is available to us. In other words, we can only create entries based on actual research already. There are a lot of loopholes especially in ethnographic studies. There are a lot of them. But the consideration there from 1994 to now there are a lot of letters. It's amazing. It's really amazing what is published in all the arts between 1994 and today. To what do you attribute that? That explosion in scholarship and in writing? The maturity of a certain generation. I think it's to the encyclopedia itself. It already came out. Maybe it contributed to that too. Which is, by the way, one of the things that we want to generate also. In architecture, there are a lot of buildings. I made sure that the retratos are beautiful. Because there are conservatism and agendas. We want to see people that are important to us. That we're hoping we can save these buildings from the wrecking ball that way. We're in a rush to destroy our heritage. Our leaders are not appreciative of this heritage. That's a very important advocacy of the encyclopedia. Cultural memory. Yes, exactly. Actually that's what for me the encyclopedia is going to serve cultural memory. Promote cultural memory. A lot of this data will probably be found in the encyclopedia years from now. Exactly. It's a fact-checking. Of course, in the encyclopedia, it's a compendium of facts. Processes that you're going through to make sure the facts are correct. How will you handle protests once the encyclopedia is out? You're like... There will be contention. How do you plan to handle that? Do you have a process in place on how to correct and increase? Actually, what Chris said is that it has a system that you have to correct because it's an ongoing thing. Don't correct immediately. The correction will be fact-checked. Of course. There are also volumes on the list, on the encyclopedia. The lists are long, but there are a lot that are not included. Not that they're not deserving, but for one reason or the other, I don't have enough data to answer. That's a lot. We've brought the forms so that they can fill up. They don't answer. That's a big medium. Of course, what will happen there will be dependent on published data. If there's a mistake, the mistake will be perpetuated. But of course, a counter-check in theater we have called all the critics who are active and people from different organizations so that we can look at them. Is it right to do this? Who should join and who shouldn't. And then of course, the data will be given to Apo, to Leo, to me, I'll go back again with corrections, I'll go back again. How many times is this? Maybe five times at least. And then of course, when it's laid out, I'm asking all of them to read everything again. How fast is this? How fast is this? Who is fast? The budget we got from the Department of Budget is 45 million. And then the University of the Philippines recently entered with a grant of another 14 million. This allows us to double the publishing and the print version. Originally, it was only 1,000 copies but now, because of the 14 million grant, it will double it. It will double the 2,000 copies. So it can be reserved for you? Yes, it can. If you have 5,000 discounts, if you have... How much will the set cost? Right now, the cost is 45,000 per set. But the additional marketing cost is about 50,000. The online book for all of our public schools and state universities will be really competitive and accessible. Okay, this has been great. It's been wonderful. Our time is coming to an end. I would like to hear a few words from each of us. Let's see. Okay, me first. We're very happy that you invited us here. So we can talk about the encyclopedia. We're very excited that this is coming out in December, Chris. November is our launch date. Okay. We hope to see you all at the launch. Yes. I think the good thing is that this is a cultural memory. Although that memory is painful, but a lot of that is to help if we don't have any identity, we don't have any identity. So if we know those good things, it will be painful or good things. It's very good to be part of this project. Exciting. I would like to start workshop sessions for students to maximize the encyclopedia. As an educator, I learned that I became a part of this project. Even though the editing process was also difficult, but it was a fruitful process. There are a lot of learning points that we can share in our academic lives. In our second edition of the CCP Encyclopedia of Philippine Art, I would safely say is going to be the most authoritative, the most comprehensive resource for Philippine art and culture. This has been gathered by more than 300 leading scholars in arts and culture in the country. It will be because of it has a print and an online version. It becomes continually updatable and highly interactive and highly customizable for different kinds of users. So, we hope with this launch of our second edition, the reach of our Philippine cultural content not only locally, but in the worldwide web. I would say that this cultural project is not just cultural. It has an effect on our country. Because the perspective of the Encyclopedia is the creation of arts that are pluralistic that respect human rights that are democratic in orientation. So, I would say that this will have a impact on the next generations. And that is what we hope for. That it will be more a big part of the Philippine culture and its country. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.