Puno Ng Buhay (Tree of Life/Full of Life)
Handmade and natural watercolours and 23.5k shell gold on abaca paper
76 x 62 cm

Puno Ng Sigla (Tree of Vigor)
Handmade and natural watercolours and 23.5k shell gold on abaca paper
76 x 62 cm

Ang Patuloy Na Paglaki Patungo Sa Kalangitan (The Continuous Growth Towards The Heavens)
Handmade and natural watercolours and 23k gold leaf on abaca paper
76 x 62 cm

Artist statement

I am a visual artist from Laguna, Philippines. Having worked with indigenous communities in the Philippines since 2016, I have developed a great love for the traditional arts and crafts. This led me to pursue my master’s degree at the Princes Foundation School of Traditional Arts, in London. Here, I began a love affair with a multitude of art forms namely: biomorphs, sacred geometry, ceramics, and Islamic illumination.

Growth, Beauty, and spirituality are key concepts that bind all aspects of life and even more in making art. In my years of studying different traditions of making age-old pigments and dyes, I have directed my creative practice towards pigment as material and metaphor. However, I have wondered how, as an artist, I could give meaningful structure to these wild and vivid colors when applied on paper. I wanted to refocus my efforts into not just creating representations of the natural world, but also to reflect what is beyond the visible image: to embody its symbolism and spiritual meaning in a way that is beautiful.

My journey in the School has led me to understand that a seed of Divine Inspiration (in whatever form, art and beyond) – when planted with profound faith and correct intention into fertile earth, together with light and water, encouragement and discipline – will flourish into something of great Beauty. In the same manner, I have treated my second project as a careful journey into discovering the right seeds and ingredients to grow my Self.

In my first year on the MA programme, I was introduced to sacred geometry, ceramics, biomorphic design, and Turkish illumination (Tezhip). It felt natural for me to look into Philippine manuscripts and traditions of making materials. This led me to examine digital representations of select Quranic manuscript illuminations made by Philippine Muslims from Mindanao. These manuscripts are all scattered worldwide but thankfully some have been digitized.

For my second-year project, I studied select illuminated border designs, I recreated them, first by identifying their underlying geometric structures, from their overall compositional proportions to the smallest details of their vegetal designs. Second, I re-oriented and re-proportioned design elements of all three paintings together with their borders, to create more unified and harmonious images. I married the illuminated borders with different designs of the tree of life inspired by my investigations into Maranao textile patchwork, wood carvings (okir) and ornamentation. The tree, growing towards heaven, being multi-faceted in symbolic value across different cultures and religions, was the perfect metaphor for my inner growth. Lastly, I created the paintings using handmade paper and pigments made from natural sources from the Philippines. It has also been a glorious aspect of the process to re-introduce genuine gold in my paintings. Since gold is tied to my ancestral identity as a material long lost from my country’s possession because of colonialism.

In terms of design enquiry and patternmaking, I drew upon a certain manuscript’s motif (14th century, no name) in creating a set of ceramic tiles. I wished to capture the same optical illusion of a kusikus (whirlpool) design which is present in the hand-woven binakul textiles of the Ifugaos (Northern Luzon indigenous people). These terracotta tiles are to be installed on the exterior of a building facing towards a garden and will serve protection from the wind gods. In a more illustrative painting, I was able to completely design my own narration of the myth of the “Bakunawa” or sea-serpent that tries to devour the last of the 7 moons in the sky.

Overall, the entire project is a series of different subjects and interests which I strongly gravitate towards. This explorative project of mine encompasses rediscovering my ancestor’s historic and animistic ways, our mythologies, as well as re-orienting my personal attitude towards my spirituality and artmaking. Now that I have found and planted many seeds, I only hope to see how they flourish.

Biography

Katrina Gosiengfiao, more known by her artist name Kat Grow, is a Filipina visual artist from Laguna, Philippines who has been exhibiting (group and solo shows) in galleries nationally. She is a graduate of the University of the Philippines, Diliman where she received her cum laude award and bachelor’s degree in fine arts, major in Painting. She was recipient of the grand prize for the Shell’s National Student Art Competition for the sculpture category in 2013 and the Artery Mentorship Program in 2014. She was named one of today’s leading abstract artists in Manila in a book published by Art Plus Magazine in 2021.

Kat arrived in London with a great zeal and affinity for art technology, historic pigment-making has been her entry point into the traditional arts. She has been researching about it and has been making pigments in collaboration with indigenous communities in the Philippines since 2016. This ongoing love for traditional crafts led her to pursue her Masters in Traditional Arts in the Prince’s Foundation School of Traditional Arts. Now she is in a love affair with a multitude of art forms namely: arabesques and biomorphs, sacred geometry, ceramics, Tezhip and Islamic illumination, and Turkish paper marbling. She is currently exploring the subtleties of art-making and personal spiritual growth with themes from Philippine myths and Mindanao manuscripts.

Contact

Social Media:
https://www.instagram.com/kat.grow/
https://www.instagram.com/katastrophe_art/

Website:
https://www.katgrow.com/