In celebration of the Philippine Arts Month, the UST Museum held the 2019 UST Annual Inter-School On-the-Spot Painting Competition on February 15, 2019 at the UST Benavides Garden.
With the theme “Viewing the Shades of Love,” participants were given the opportunity to share their sentiments and ideas about love through visual art. Colleges and universities in and around Metro Manila were invited to send up to 25 fine arts students
each to compete in the oldest student art competition of its kind. The awarding ceremonies and exhibit opening were held later that same day at 6:00 p.m. at the Main
Building Lobby, where the winning works remained on exhibit until February 28, 2019.
Winning first place was “Kaleidoscope” by Steven John Natal from Bulacan State University. Second place was “(IN) COMPLETE” by Christian M. Casimiro from Far Eastern University and third place was “Home”
by Allan Dale Licaros from Eulogio “Amang” Rodriguez Institute of Science and Technology (EARIST). “Love Exists” by Christian Jame F. Maglente, who is also from EARIST, won the Metrobank Choice Award.
The first honorable mention was awarded to “Tunay na pagmamahal” by Warren L. Tanguilig of EARIST, while John Rowell N. Correa of Bulacan State University won the second honorable mention for his work “Sa kabila
ng pagsubok.” The third honorable mention was awarded to Louis Rafael L. Espinosa of UST for his painting “Nothing is impossible.”
The winners received cash prizes, with gift items and gift certificates. The first prize winner received Php 40,000, the second prize winner took home Php 30,000, while the third prize winner collected Php 20,000.
The contest had its origins in 1941, when the University presented major art events that made a mark in Philippine Art History. Then Rector Magnificus, Rev. Fr. Silvestre Sancho, O.P., sponsored the First National
Art Competition, and an exhibition of all 93 participating entries was mounted at the University Gymnasium.
Some of the winners of the competition were eventually included in Prof. Victorio Edades’ list of young artists who showed modernist inclinations, known as the “13 Moderns.” They were: Vicente Manansala, Ricarte
Puruganan, Galo Ocampo, and Arsenio Capili. Edades himself was later declared a National Artist in 1976. In the years following the contest, the initiative of the First National Art Competition became the UST
Annual Inter-School On-the-Spot Painting Competition (OTSPC). This became one of the most anticipated campus activities participated in by Fine Arts Students in Metro Manila and nearby areas.
Several student winners of the UST OTSPC are now celebrated names in the contemporary art scene, among them Ronald Ventura, Mark Salvatus, and Raffy Napay.
