As Manila’s creative stringpuller supreme, Roberto Chabet’s tutelage of younger artists has won him a formidable reputation across the Philippines. Ronald Achacoso meets him.

In the last few decades, Roberto Chabet has been the single most influential contemporary artist in the Philippines. Though more of a conceptual artist than a painter himself, he’s been instrumental in introducing a cerebral facet to many painters under his tutelage who have gained considerable recognition outside Manila. He was designated art director of the Cultural Centre of the Philippines when it was inaugurated by Imelda Marcos in the early ’70s, but resigned unexpectedly, opting instead to teach at the University of the Philippines’ College of Fine Arts, where at times, in the course of his formidable presence there (which spanned almost four decades), his name virtually became synonymous with the college itself. We talked to him ahead of the Hong Kong part of his ongoing retrospective exhibition series, Chabet 50 Years.

You’re finally having a retrospective that seems long overdue. What do you make of the fuss about Roberto Chabet, the conceptual artist, the mentor and his art?
I have to detach myself from all this. In a way this has a lot to do with the art market. I’m supposed to be ‘historical’ and history has become some kind of commodity in art these days. Back then it was something I was trying to resist – with the way I work – I didn’t pay much attention to selling. But it’s difficult to get away from it. It’s good in a way because this market now generates interest in somebody like me who would otherwise be overlooked. And it’s not just here [Manila], it’s happening all over – there seems to be a pursuit of important artists who may have not got the attention they deserve. Now they are rediscovering little-known artists who were way ahead of their time, and historians start asking why this or that artist did not become part of the existing canon.

In the Philippines you have attained such cult-figure status that at times it becomes difficult to see the humour in your work within its more serious dimensions.
Oh yes, that’s it. It’s ephemeral and all that. Maybe this has to do with the idea that from the very beginning I was doing things just for fun. I don’t know if I told this story before, but when I was in high school in Ateneo, we had this English textbook and it had a story there entitled “Just for Fun”. It was about a character who was not serious about what he did, and did everything just for fun. He eventually had a calling and became a priest and said, “Oh, this is just for fun”. It was written by Father de la Costa, dean of Ateneo de Manila University. He was my teacher and we became friends. In a way I think his attitude just seeped into my consciousness. The idea of Shop 6 [a 1970s experimental art gallery], for instance, was just play – and I took the job at CCP [Cultural Centre of the Philippines]...

... just for fun?
[Laughs] Yes, but at the same time you want to make something out of your life, maybe just to impress your father. [Laughs] When I had my first one-man show in the early ’60s my parents didn’t know I had become a recognised artist, and I found that very amusing. I mean, when I took up architecture my father approved of it because it was a practical profession, but I thought it provided a good opportunity for me to learn more about art.

But your works have often been labelled ‘difficult’ – not the sort of thing the layman would immediately like.
I personally had an aversion for it at the start, when I was a freshman, but they always haunted me until I became totally seduced by it. You have to be prepared to engage yourself with it, as it always seemed to push or probe into your aesthetic sensibilities. When I was much younger, the type of works that I liked [was] Degas or Toulouse-Lautrec because this was the kind of art I was exposed to, or saw in Life magazine. I still like them – Lautrec is still very avant-garde. I don’t know [about ‘difficult’ though], I recently saw Lee Aguinaldo’s, [a contemporary artist and personal friend] exhibit in Ateneo and when you look at it, that’s real art and I’ve never done anything like that. You see Lee’s work and you cannot help but like it. This is the classical notion of what abstract art should be. Well, in my installations, there was an ambition to be like that in my own way, but there always was an option for people not to like it. The viewers can look at it and say, “Ah, that’s a Chabet” – that’s acknowledged, but it doesn’t necessarily grab them. [Laughs]

In the ’80 conceptual artist Redza Piyadaza, who some consider your Malaysian counterpart, sought you out to engage you in some kind of intellectual wrestling match. You wouldn’t indulge him and dismissed the whole thing.
That was a long time ago, but yes, he arrived in Nanette’s, a café near UP, unannounced one afternoon and he wanted to take me aside and talk to me alone. But I was enjoying my beer with friends and students and I wasn’t really interested in his discourse so things didn’t turn out too well. I think he heard a lot about me from Ray Albano, who took over my position at the CCP when I left and also probably because he had a similar scholarship grant like the Rockefeller grant I had in the US – though we never met abroad. He knew Ray personally and he was here in Manila quite regularly and I guess he was very curious about Manila’s quiet but vigorous conceptual art practice.

Your mercurial temper was legendary then. I remember him apologising afterwards and admitting that he was – and he used an odd word – “jousting” with you.
“Jousting”, yes. You know back then people expected me to behave a certain way. I had a reputation of being some kind of ‘enfant terrible’. It was like a role assigned to me so naturally I didn’t want to disappoint anyone. [Laughs] If you really think about it, my behaviour was really some kind of a performance. They expected me to be some kind of holy terror so I played the part… I guess up to now.

You mentioned about your work having an ephemeral quality. Do you find it somewhat ironic that there is now so much documentation being done on your work?
The documentation is not part of my work anymore. I just leave it to others to sort it out. I used to tell everyone how I envisioned myself in my later years: that I would quietly retire, fade away and just enjoy myself. When Typhoon Ketsana ravaged the country in 2009, we had to be rescued by boat, and abandoned the house and the artworks to the raging waters. You just want to let go – everything was heading towards that anyway. My works always had to do with memory and inevitable loss; the temporal nature of moments. It would have been a dramatic, resonant exit, losing everything to the flood – but as it turns out, a lot of the works have been salvaged and now there’s all this work to do. [Laughs]

Complete & Unabridged, Part II is at Osage Kwun Tong, and Intermediate Geography is at Osage Soho, from March 5 to May 9.