Pep Manalang, Abstract Artist
Pep Manalang aka “Maria Belina S. Manalang” is an abstract artist whose paintings have been widely exhibited in Manila, Philippines. She is also an amateur photographer who does her own darkroom work.
Pep is represented by Finale Art File, West Gallery, and The Drawing Room, in Metro Manila.
She studied Architecture and Physics before obtaining her Certificate in Painting from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia. Her degrees include B.S. Physics from University of the Philippines, Diliman, and M.A.Physics from SUNY Buffalo.
Pep has currently been working mostly with acrylic paint, on paper, wood, or canvas. She uses modeling paste to create texture and layers paint washes to achieve different tonalities and color compositions. She often starts with a symmetrical composition then uses repetition of lines to complete the framework.
Artist’s Statement 2010
I paint abstract paintings using acrylics for immediacy. The speed with which acrylic paint dries allows me to work and re-work fast. I like the contrast of lightly worked areas with heavily textured areas, transparent areas with opaque areas.
My paintings are often landscape-based in an abstract way – there is foreground and background, object and space.
One recurring theme is the repetition of lines.
I am inspired by ideas for compositions – how to divide the painting surface – and by certain color combinations. I am inspired by the different appearances that paint can take on.
My work seems to fall into two categories – either a highly structured composition, or a more loosely conceived framework of pencil lines with acrylic washes.
My current work combines these two tendencies.
In my latest series, the paintings were very immediate; they came into being without much conscious thought or criticism. In that sense I consider them “purer” paintings. They were painted out of a need to “release” something. The paintings were made rapidly and had their own direction.