The artistic traditions of the Philippines developed over thousands of years through contact between peoples. Pottery dating back to 3200 BC shows early Filipinos practiced pottery for household and funerary uses. Decorative styles included incising, impressing, and painting designs. Basketry and mat-making predate pottery and styles vary by region. Carving has roots in Neolithic boat-shaped coffins and included religious idols at colonization. Weaving traditions also date back millennia as shown through prehistoric textile imprints, with styles and materials changing over time between highland and lowland groups. Artistic traditions demonstrate diffusion of ideas and are adapted to local materials and simple tool technologies.

1. By Mercidita Jose-Dela Cruz
Philippine Artistic Tradition

2. Philippine Artistic Tradition
Started…
probably THOUSANDS of years
after man arrived on Philippine soil

3. Philippine Artistic Tradition

4. Philippine Artistic Tradition
“ Interisland contact, facilitated by the
introduction of water crafts, resulted
in constant communication among
peoples and in the spread and
sharing of methods of producing
food, clothing and housing.”

5. Philippine Artistic Tradition
POTTERY

6. Pottery
 In the Philippines, pottery shards dated as
early as 3200 + 160 B.C. and associated with
human remains prove that early Filipinos have
practiced tradition.

7. Pottery according to function
 Household pottery functions as a container for water,
rice and other foodstuffs.
 Simple in form
 Oftentimes undecorated
 Funerary pottery used to bury human remains in
or as accessories in the ritual paraphernalia.
 Interesting forms and motifs

8.  The Techniques by which motifs are applied on the soft
clay are incision and impression
 Impressed and incised motifs are combined to form a
compound pattern as in impressed punctuations applied in
a bounded area to emphasize the incised patterns.
Philippine Artistic TraditionPottery

9. Prehistoric decorated pottery were mostly
used as mortuary vessels.
Through the designs or markings on the
mortuary vessels one can be able to see the
prehistoric belief system that focuses on a life
after death.

10.  Carvings in the
round of humanlike
images such found
on the “ship-of-the-
dead” were done
mostly on the
covers of big burial
jars.
 But these carvings
as pottery
decorations are
very rare.

11. Painting as pottery decoration is likewise rare.
Usually in red or red and black, painting is used
only to emphasize incised patterns.

12. Traditional Pottery uses:
• Red clay
• Ashes
• Sands
They are formed into jars,
jugs, bowls and pots by
hand w/ the aid of a
wooden pestle and stone
anvil or by a potter’s
wheel.

13. The traditional pottery persisted among the highland as well as the lowland
groups. Studies show some marked similarities in the sequence but there are also
differences that necessitated the grouping of pottery manufacture by sequence
categories.
Bontoc sequence- pottery is molded and shaped by hand using simple tools as paddle,
anvil and, as supporting device, a broken pottery rim.
Ilocano sequence- produce turn-modelled pottery. Use of unpivoted turntable is the
difference
Bagobo sequence- compromised by hand modelling, molding and coiling . Adding clay
by strips in the formation of the body provides the difference in this method.
Ivatan sequence- Slab modelling is exclusive to the Ivatan of Batanes. The starting
piece is flattened into a thick slab which is placed in a small, round, shallow bowl-like,
wooden form and molded.

14. BASKETRY &
MAT-MAKING

15. Basketry & Mat-Making
 Older than pottery tradition
 There are as many styles as there are tribal
groups in the Philippines
 The only instrument used in basketry and mat-
making is a sharp instrument such as a knife.

16. Basketry & Mat-Making
Big sturdy & plain baskets, made into squares &
rectangles, sometimes w/rounded bodies, with or
without covers and handles, are invariably used for
storing rice or camote, for transporting clothes and
other personal effects to the place of work and for
preserving all kinds of food.

17. Basketry & Mat-Making
Mats come in square, rectangles, triangles and circles.
Rectangular mats are used to sleep on or to wrap the
dead with. The other shapes in smaller versions are
used in rituals or as wall decors.

18. Basketry & Mat-Making
Baskets used for fish traps and shrimp containers
come in triangular, trapezoidal and cylindrical
shapes, they are oftentimes provided w/
contraptions to prevent the escape of the prey.

19. Basketry & Mat-Making
Men’s headgear, lady’s bag and purses and decorative mats
are applied with decorative beads, bone, feathers and
tassels
Design may be embroidered or simply dyed
Regional preferences again are shown in the choice of color
and ornaments used on the mats and baskets.

21. CARVING
Philippine Artistic Tradition

22. Carving
 Existed in the Neolithic times
 The earliest pieces are the boat-shaped coffins
found in Palawan

23. Philippine Artistic Tradition
Philippine Artistic Tradition
During the Spanish campaign to Christianize the
islands in the 16th century, carvings in the form of
religious idols made of wood, stone, gold or ivory were
found in the highlands and the lowlands of Luzon as well
as of Mindanao.
Carving

24. Philippine Artistic TraditionCarving
Linguistically , the vocabulary of Philippine ethnic
groups are-replete with words and terms associated
with the carving tradition. Okir or Ukkil, a Muslim
word meaning to carve or to sculpt has even extended
itself to mean

25. Carving
The Ritualistic
carvings are the
direct result of
their
absorption in
Gods and
supernatural
beings.

26. Carving
Two Purposive types;
 Decorative
 Ritualistic

27. Philippine Artistic Tradition
WEAVING

28. Weaving
 The antiquity of the weaving tradition in the
Philippines is evidenced by textile imprints found to
be associated with prehistoric metal materials.
 Form, decoration and function of comparatively late
ethnic textiles indicate at least some weaving methods
which have been practiced w/ little alteration.

29. Weaving

30. Weaving
 A tapis or a malong, well woven of good strong
materials, generally lasts for more than one
generation
 Sometimes the original motif would be preserved
although they have been copied over and over

31. Weaving
 Using embellishments e.g. embroidery, patchwork,
beadwork, appliques, and so on, the ethnic weavers
transpose local legends and myths into pattern
designs of man and animal figures, stars, moon and
plants.

32. Weaving

33. Weaving
 Not all groups weave their own cloth. There are
some who have mastered the skills. Others, depend
on imported textiles or bark cloth for their needs.
 Internal trade permits the distribution of locally
woven products.

34. Weaving
 Weaving among the lowlanders, however, have lost
some of their originality in both designs and
materials. What has been lost or changed, however,
is replaced w/ techniques otherwise unknown to
their highland counterparts.

35. Philippine Artistic Tradition
The development of the artistic tradition described
above is determined by such processes as diffusion,
invention, patterning or integration. Each is
characterized by being made using simple and
oftentimes crude tools, by artists who oftentimes limit
possibilities for design.