Richmond, B.C.
He mentored people who are now accomplished artists
Teodoro Alcuitas
Editor, PhilippineCanadianNews.Com (PCN.Com)
A well-known artist and mentor to many has died.
Sofronio Ylanan Mendoza, better known by his initials SYM has died, his friends posted on social media. He was 87.
The unassuming and humble artist has been suffering from a heart condition for some time causing him to cut back on his work and activities.
As founder of the Dimasalang Group which he originally started in back in the Philippines, he continued the group in Canada where he moved in 1981 with his family of seven.
From poverty to fame
His journey in the art world did not come easy for the artist who was born in a small town of Putat Bagong Bayan in Cebu in 1934.
At 27, he came into the ambit of the Cebuano master, Martino A. Abellana of Carcar, Cebu together with the young Romulo Galicano, also from Carcar, who was only 12 years-old at the time. The two were part of a coterie of young emerging artists that Abellana brought to his fold, teaching them the rudiments of painting for free. His only condition was that you nurture your love for drawing and he encouraged you to persevere.
This writer was one of those students and experienced Abellana’s generosity – he not only mentored us but also provided the materials. The cost of materials discouraged me from pursuing art school and went to architecture instead. As a fellow Carcaranon, I continued my friendship with the master until his death in 1986. I feel privileged to own some of Abellana originals in oil and water colour.
Abellana attributes the success of Mendoza and Galicano to their hard work and “both earned their success.”
“They had a difficult time when they went to Manila but they never gave up,” he told the writer Winand W. Klassen in his conversations with the master in his book: Martino Abellana and Philippine Painting: Conversatiosn with the Artist.
“Mendoza opened an advertising agency just to survive but he never lost sight of the most important thing, to master his art.”
He eked out a living in the big city of Manila, sleeping in a tent in the Luneta and churning out decorative paintings for tourists.
Later, he was introduced to a budding art dealer, Cipriano Villaneuva, who took him under his wing and put him to formal studies at the University of Santo Tomas. He eventually married his benefactor’s daughter Elena and started a family. He also started to form a group that included his fellow Cebuano and Abellana protege, Romulo Galicano. The group was named the Dimasalang Group after the street in Sampaloc where he maintained a studio.
He was on his way into the formal art world and his works begun to be recognized and winning competitions.
In 1981, he uprooted himself and immigrated to Canada settling in Richmond with wife and seven children.
The prodigious artist continued to work at his art and also catered to a loyal following in the Philippines who supported and bought his work. This allowed him to earn a living doing what he loved.
Like his mentor Abellana, SYM shared his talents to the Filipino community by conducting painting lessons at his home. He was soon attracting a following of students which have gone to their own achievements. Among them is Leo Orpilla Cunanan who is now an emerging artist.
He revived the Dimasalang Group in Vancouver to gather and mentor interested members of the community.
SYM has been recognized in the art world in B.C. and beyond with numerous awards and his work sold in art galleries both locally and in the Philippines.
“The bottom line in art is total freedom of expression,” he says. “As an artist, you have the license to express yourself the way you want, even if it means reviving the past. It’s all up to you. As long as what you paint is different from the rest. You have to have a signature, otherwise it’s as if you’ve remained a student all your life.”
His life and work is chronicled in the coffee-table book: ‘SYM: His Life and Struggles’ by Alfredo Roces and Sandy Gillis.
Great visual artist.
I own one of his works which I have kept for so long now. It’s a Binondo Scene beautifully done in oil and signed ‘66. What can I do with it now? Convert to money? Kindly advise. I’d like to part with it now. My long-time buddy Lorenzo J. Cruz gifted it to me back in ‘88 from his resto in Georgetown, Washington D.C., U.S.A.