Juvenal Sansó shows some of his psychedelic slides

"Just flowers?” asks an uninitiated viewer, while passing by the master painter’s flora and fauna exhibit in an art gallery. “Well, he’s not that good of a painter then, eh?” says another one in a smart-aleck manner, appearing sort of chagrined by what he had just seen.

A repartee such as this, as callous and severe as it could be, is inevitably one of the constants in the art circuit. Once you’ve made it big, people are gung-ho to put you down. Of course, this could only come from the unversed and the dilettante—those who only care to say something just for the heck of it. Unfortunately, Spanish senior visual artist and Filipino-at-heart Juvenal Sansó is one of its victims.

But Sansó is not just actually an accomplished painter of blooms; he is a versatile artist that has exhaustively done anything and everything with his talent. He is not just a painter but also a printmaker, photographer, and once a set and costume designer for several opera houses in France in his youth.

And those who have just only seen a part of the artist’s works, as in only his beautifully made landscapes and blooms, may just have to rethink their notion about Sansó’s artistic capabilities once they see his recent exhibition which recently opened at the Sapphire Ballroom of the Mandarin Oriental Suites in Gateway Mall billed as “Premier Sansó: A Show of Shows.” The show displays over a hundred of the artist’s rare and never-before-seen works from different periods in his inspired career.

Presented in the show are works from the artist’s personal collection such as opuses done in his studio in Paris, his early sketches, and pieces on loan from art collectors. Viewers may also see Sansó’s seascapes done in the 1980s. These were seascapes stirred from the 24 Brittany summers he spent from 1958 to 1982 along with his friends Yves and Agnes le Dantec, daughter of the French expressionist Georges Roault.

Also occupying the exhibit space is the artist’s ‘baklad’ and ‘barong-barong’ (shanty) series. Some of these paintings portray “linear representations of fish pens and structures on the Manila Bay shoreline” that he saw from an aerial view while his plane was landing in Manila back in the day.

The works are grouped into sections so that art enthusiasts will feel like they’re walking through with Sansó throughout the various phases in his artistic sojourn. Budding and long-time art collectors won’t be disappointed however, for the exhibit will also showcase new and large works from the artist that are on sale.

Frankly though, there are still many exceptional pieces that people have yet to see from Sansó’s illustrious and prolific repertoire. There are still countless polychrome photographs, psychedelic slides, works on paper, and his early nightmarish paintings rendered with much anguish that people might not have a clue about, among others, yet to be made public.

Asked why he couldn’t show them all at once, Sansó replied: “One at a time.” And this brings us to think that there will be more shows, more exhibits from the master artist to look forward to.

And truthfully, we can’t wait for them.

‘Premier Sansó: A Show of Shows’ runs until November 24, a day after the artist’s birthday, at the Mandarin Oriental Suites, Gateway Mall, Araneta Center, Cubao, Quezon City. It is open to the public and admission is free. For more information, log on to www.aranetacenter.net and www.gatewaymall.com.ph.

*Sansó will be affixing his signature on previously unsigned works in a Special Authentication Day to be held on November 16, 4 p.m. in the same venue.