Dubai: Three Filipino artists are reviving the dying craft of hand painting signages in this digital age as part of the Dubai Design Week.
Dubai-based design studio Ape Creative launched its typography exploration named “Byahe” on Sunday evening to bring back the spotlight on the art of signage. The exhibition is part of Assembly, which presents weeklong exhibitions and programmes at Alserkal Avenue in conjunction with Dubai Design Week.
“Byahe” is a Filipino word for “travel” or “trip”. The exhibition specifically draws inspiration from the hand-painted signage found mostly on side streets and on the iconic “Jeepney”, the most popular mode of public transport in the Philippines, which has become a ubiquitous symbol of Philippine culture and art. But such hand-painted artworks also used to be found in many countries, especially in east Europe and Africa, long before the advent of digital technology.
“[This] will bring alive the craft of sign painters that dominated the streets back then. The show is bound to let you peep into the history and let you explore certain connections with different cultures across the world,” Shaikha Wafa Hasher Al Maktoum said earlier.
The works aim to detach visitors from the world of fast-paced instant consumption of digital technology to reconnect them with the traditional art of lettering. It also aims to bring a fresh perspective to the Philippine culture through its art and design while finding a connection with other cultures from around the world.
More than 60 artworks were painted using enamel paint on metal plates by Rollan Rodriguez, founder and creative director of Ape Creative, and artists Mary Hechanova and Jude Valderrama.
“We chose signage because it’s the strongest form of communication when you’re on the road. We chose hand-painted design because it’s a dying craft in this digital age. We wanted to revive it but we also wanted to mix in the technology of today with an old craft,” Hechanova told Gulf News.
“We wanted to tell the story of a journey of people. People are always going from point A to point B, going to different places, especially the expats in the UAE,” she added.
Even the creative aspect of hand painting was itself a learning process for them since they are mainly digital graphic artists, Valderrama said.
“We went outside our comfort zone because we’re a fan of the craft. There is always beauty in crafting things. There’s beauty in strokes, mixture of colours, and we want to get our hands dirty,” Valderrama said.
Apart from the signage with people’s countries and cities on it, the signages also showed popular phrases used in the UAE to connect the viewer in this region with the art such as “kaliwali”, “yallah go”, “ma baarif”, “my friend”, among others.
WHAT: Byahe: A Typographic Exploration
WHEN: October 24 to 29
WHERE: FN Designs, Alserkal Avenue
