Professional Documents
Culture Documents
2. Content
a. What is the theme of the painting?
Itak sa Puso ni Mang Juan is a feedback on the negative impacts of globalization
or commercialization in the Philippines. As perceived, a dagger-like tail of the letter C in
the companys title is pointed at the heart of Mang Juan. This exposes the struggle of
an average Filipino worker, the embodiment of the Filipino public or the masa, against
the agonizing monopoly and economic control of international corporations, most of
which are offering products and services that entice consumers to live life according to
wants, and not needs.
4. Context
a. In what type of society has the work been produced?
The painting Itak sa Puso ni Mang Juan was painted by Antipas Delotavo in
1978. It was painted on a paper using watercolour during the Marcos Regime which
aims to put emphasis on Nationalist Art in the quest for national identity and on the
need to break away from the western-oriented culture.
b. Is the message relevant in the present times?
Yes. Mang Juan appears to me as if he is being held back by himself or an
intangible presence. This may be read as a symbolism of us Filipinos not being able to
move forward because of our own faults. We are being held back not only by an
intangible presence, neo-colonialism, but also because of our mental colonialism. We
are being enslaved by the foreign country not in terms of violence and warfare but in
terms of our culture and economy.
Itak sa Puso ni Mang Juan is a realist depiction of the abstract thought of what
capitalism, globalism, colonialism is doing to our country. The artist managed to bring
into focus the economic and political relationship between the logo and Mang Juans
body.
c. Does the title contribute to the message of the painting? in what way?
Yes, Itak sa Puso ni Mang Juan which symbolizes by the bladelike tail of the
Coca-Cola sign seems to stab the old mans heart, drained of blood and vigor
symbolically depicts the harsh reality of transnational corporations.
5. Personal Opinion
a. What other title can you give this painting?
The Painful Truth about the Coca-Cola Company
b. Pretend that you were inside this painting. How would you have felt? Why
would you feel that way?
I would have felt the agony and pain of Mang Juan, too. The fact that
transnational corporations are ruling in the Philippines shows that we are not yet free
from the hands of our foreign oppressors. The negative effects of globalization and
commercialization directly affects the lives of ordinary Filipino workers.
c. Why did the artist made this painting?
Delotavo explains that he was drawn to the Coke icon because for him it
incarnated the ubiquity of the US in the Third World; its internecine interventions in
Southeast Asia; and its support for the Ferdinand Marcos regime in the Philippines,
which hosted two of the USs largest foreign military bases. Also crucial here is
advertising as a vehicle of imperialism, in guaranteeing the USs hegemonic presence
in the economy and culture of the Philippines even after it gained independence in
1946, following nearly fifty years of US rule and three centuries of Spanish occupation.
The Coke logo is concomitantly a cipher of capitalism and, in Delotavos own words, of
cultural enslavement.
d. What do you think is the extraordinary about his painting?
As for me, belonging to a financially unstable family, the big picture suggested
here is that Coca-Colas presence in the country grants it the power to manipulate the
economy, and eventually, the peoples lives then centered on basic needs like food,
shelter and water, being faced with or dueled by the companys products like Coke,
Royal and Sprite. Thus, it draws out the idea that art is an excavation of the artists
imagination and that it comes along with the progression of society and history.
Moreover, a connection becomes established between the viewer and the viewed since
the latter signifies things Filipinos are accustomed to: the physical attributes of Mang
Juan (skin and hair colors, faade, and dress code), the companys title Coca-Cola, and
the artworks identity (work label and author).