As to why one chooses the path of an artist, one will never know…. And yet, there they go, compelled by forces beyond themselves, helpless, vulnerable to the urges that make it almost physically painful not to be able to pick up that brush and touch paint to canvas, ink to paper, verse to poetry, notes to harmony….. The same affliction visits our artist, oil painter Ms Janine Barrera Castillo. As per her words, not to paint is akin to physical hurt. It is almost impossible to fathom life without the self conscious and introspective activity of applying pigment to a two dimensional surface, in spite of never knowing how it will manifest itself, nor how it will resolve itself.
Born and raised in the Island of Cebu, in the southern parts of the Philippines, Janine Barrera Castillo started her formal art education at the University of the Philippines, College of Fine Arts, where she finished a Bachelor’s Degree in Fine Arts. While at university, she garnered some prestigious awards, most notably the Jose Joya Annual Painting Competition where she won first place three times in all categories. After two solo exhibits in the Philippines, as well as several group shows, she joined another competition, this time for a full scholarship to study in the United States. The scholarship competition was offered by the Starr Foundation of New York. To her biggest surprise she won the competition! And off she went to the United States to pursue her Masters Degree in Fine Arts at the Academy of Art in San Francisco, CA. She now resides in the San Francisco Bay Area, practicing as an artist in the area. She is very much active in the local art scene and exhibits regularly in various locations. Her art exhibits span from California all the way to Asia, most specially in her native Philippines where her work continues to increase in value and prestige.
Ms Barrera’s work would be best described as abstract landscapes. A normal day for her begins with a sixty minute walk through the landscape that surrounds her home, a landscape that’s full of centuries old Oak trees, rolling green hills and vineyards. Inevitably these images find themselves in her paintings. In her work, she seeks neither literal imagery nor a slavish accounting of the landscape that she sees but rather a certain “wholeness” in the act of painting itself. In her own words: “…walking through the landscape that surrounds me, I see in nature a wholeness that I seek in my work, a bedrock integrity that life is as it should be, eternal and beyond doubt…” The act of painting provides Ms Barrera an opportunity to be able to explore and resolve her questions about certain human realities that concern her, such as the transience of our human world, the disbeliefs that we practice everyday, the half truths or untruths promoted by the media, and most of all the disconnect between the life we are expected to live and the life we ought to live.
But Ms Barrera is not limited to the art of painting, not by any means. She happens to enjoy writing as well and her work can be seen in several publications, notably in Pump magazine. Since painting and writing come from the same creative source, it does not come as too much of a big surprise that she expresses herself quite proficiently in both art forms. Most days of the week Ms Barrera shuts herself in her studio, focused on the only thing that matters to her at the moment. Applying paint to brush, she hopes to find certain answers to some of her life’s questions. In the process, she creates a body of work that is testament to a life dedicated to her craft.