In April 1992, the Gawad sa Manlilikha ng Bayan or the National Living Treasures Award was

institutionalized through Republic Act No. 7355. Tasked with the administration and
implementation of the Award is the National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA), the
highest policy-making and coordinating body for culture and the arts of the State. The NCCA,
through the Gawad sa Manlilikha ng Bayan Committee and an Ad Hoc Panel of Experts, conducts
the search for the finest traditional artists of the land, adopts a program that will ensure the transfer
of their skills to others and undertakes measures to promote a genuine appreciation of and instill
pride among our people about the genius of the Manlilikha ng Bayan.

First awarded in 1993 to three outstanding artists in music and poetry, the Gawad sa Manlilikha
ng Bayan has its roots in the 1988 National Folk Artists Award organized by the Rotary Club of
Makati-Ayala. As a group, these folk and traditional artists reflect the diverse heritage and cultural
traditions that transcend their beginnings to become part of our national character. As Filipinos,
they bring age-old customs, crafts and ways of living to the attention and appreciation of Filipino
life. They provide us with a vision of ourselves and of our nation, a vision we might be able to
realize someday, once we are given the opportunity to be true to ourselves as these artists have
remained truthful to their art.

As envisioned under R.A. 7355, “Manlilikha ng Bayan” shall mean a citizen engaged in any
traditional art uniquely Filipino whose distinctive skills have reached such a high level of technical
and artistic excellence and have been passed on to and widely practiced by the present
generation in his/her community with the same degree of technical and artistic competence.

REPUBLIC ACT 7355

AN ACT PROVIDING FOR THE RECOGNITION OF NATIONAL LIVING TREASURES,

OTHERWISE KNOWN AS THE MANLILIKHA NG BAYAN, AND THE PROMOTION AND
DEVELOPMENT OF TRADITIONAL FOLK ARTS, PROVIDING FUNDS THEREFOR, AND
FOR OTHER PURPOSES.

It is hereby declared to be the policy of the State to preserve and promote its traditional folk arts
whether visual, performing, or literary, for their cultural value, and to honor and support traditional
folk artists for their contribution to the national heritage by ensuring that the artistic skills which
they have painstakingly cultivated and preserved are encouraged and passed on to future
generations of Filipinos. Tasked with the administration and implementation of the Award is the
National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA), the highest policy-making and coordinating
body for culture and the arts of the State.

AMBAHAN

1993; Hanunoo Mangyan/Mansalay, Oriental

Ginaw Bilog
Mindoro; surat Mangyan and ambahan poetry

A common cultural aspect among cultural communities nationwide is the oral tradition
characterized by poetic verses which are either sung or chanted. However, what distinguishes
the rich Mangyan literary tradition from others is the ambahan, a poetic literary form composed
of seven-syllable lines used to convey messages through metaphors and images. The ambahan
is sung and its messages range from courtship, giving advice to the young, asking for a place to
stay, saying goodbye to a dear friend and so on. Such an oral tradition is commonplace among
indigenous cultural groups but the ambahan has remained in existence today chiefly because it
is etched on bamboo tubes using ancient Southeast Asian, pre-colonial script called surat
Mangyan.
Ginaw Bilog, Hanunoo Mangyan from Mansalay, Mindoro, grew up in such a cultural
environment. Already steeped in the wisdom that the ambahan is a key to the understanding of
the Mangyan soul, Ginaw took it upon himself to continually keep scores of ambahan poetry
recorded, not only on bamboo tubes but on old, dog-eared notebooks passed on to him by
friends.
MASINO INTARAY (+ 2013)
Musician and Storyteller
Pala’wan
Brookes Point, Palawan
1993
Living in the highlands of southern Palawan are the Palawan people, who, together with the
Batak and Tagbanwa, are the major indigenous cultural communities of Palawan.
The Palawan possess a rich, intense yet highly refined culture encompassing both the visible
and invisible worlds. They may not exhibit the ornate splendor of the Maranaw nor the striking
elegance of the Yakan, but their elaborate conemology, extensive poetic and literary traditions,
multi-level architecture, musical concepts, social ethic and rituals reveal a deeply spiritual
sensibility and subtle inner life of a people attuned to the myriad energies and forms of luxurious
mountain universe that is their abode, a forest environment of great trees, countless species of
plants and animals, and a magnificent firmament.
The Palawan have no notion of property. To them, the earth, sea, sky and nature’s elements
belong to no one. Their basic social ethic is one sharing. Their most important rituals such as
the tambilaw and the tinapay are forms of vast and lavish sharing, particularly of food and
drinks, skills and ideas.
The tambilaw is a collective cooking and sharing of rice which is a ritual offering to the Lord of
Rice, Ampo’t Paray, while the tinapay is the rice wine drinking ceremony. It is during such
occasions that the basal, or gong music ensemble, plays a vital role in the life of the community.
For it is the music of the basal that collectively and spiritually connects the Palawan with the
Great Lord, Ampo and the Master Rice, Ampo’t Paray. The basal enlivens the night long fast of
the drinking of the rice wine, bringing together about one hundred guests under the roof of the
kolon banwa (big house).
The gimbal (tubular drum) begins the music with a basic rhythm, then enter the sanang ( pair of
small gongs with boss and narrow rims) and one to three agungs (gongs with high bossed and
wide turned – in rims).
Basal ensemble playing is an accurate and wonderful metaphor for the basic custom of sharing
among the Palawan . For in this music no one instrument predominates. The techniques of
interlocking, counterpoint, alternation and colotomy ensure a collective oneness. The two
sanang play in alternative dynamics. When one plays loudly, the other plays softly. Contrapuntal
patterns govern the interaction of the agung with the sanang and gimbal. It is the music of
“punctuation, rhythm and color rather than melody”. Its very essence is creative cooperation and
togetherness.
A non-musical instrumental element of the basal are the young women’s rapid stamping rhythm
of their foot as they move back and forth on the bamboo slatted floor of the kolon banwa,
carrying taro leaves on both hands at their sides. This percussion dance is called tarak.
Further highlighting the intensely poetic and subtle harmony of human beings with each other
and with nature among the palawan are the kulilal and bagit traditions. The kulilal is a highly
lyrical poem expressing passionate love sang with the accompaniment of the kusyapi (two-
stringed lute), played by a man, and pagang (bamboo zither), played by a woman. The bagit,
also played on the kusyapi, is strictly instrumental music depicting the rhythms, movements and
sounds of nature, birds, monkeys, snakes, chirping of insects, rustling of leaves, the elements
and the like.
An outstanding master of the basal, kulilal and bagit is Masino, a gifted poet, bard artist, and
musician who was born near the head of the river in Makagwa valley on the foothill of
Mantalingayan mountain. Masino is not only well-versed in the instruments and traditions of the
basal, kulilal and bagit but also plays the aroding (mouth harp) and babarak (ring flute) and
above all is a prolific and pre-eminent epic chanter and story teller.
He has the creative memory, endurance, clarity of intellect and spiritual purpose that enable him
to chant all through the night, for successive nights, countless tultul (epics), sudsungit
(narratives), and tuturan (myths of origin and teachings of ancestors).
Masino and the basal and kulilal ensemble of Makagwa valley are creative, traditional artists of
the highest order of merit. (Prof. Felipe M. de Leon, Jr.)
 SAMAON SULAIMAN (+ 2011)
Musician
Magindanao
Mama sa Pano, Maguindanao
1993

The Magindanaon, who are among the largest of Filipino Islamic groups, are concentrated in the
towns of Dinaig, Datu Piang, Maganoy and Buluan in Magindanao province. Highly
sophisticated in weaving, okir designs, jewelry, metalwork and brassware, their art is Southeast
Asian yet distinct in character.

In the field of music, the Magindanaon have few peers among Filipino cultural communities.
Their masters on the kulintang (gong-chime) and kutyapi (two-stringed plucked lute) are
comparable to any instrumental virtuoso in the East or West.

The kutyapi is a favorite solo instrument among both Muslim and non-Muslim Filipinos, and is
also played in combination with other instruments. It exists in a great variety of designs, shapes
and sizes and known by such names as kotapi (Subanon), fegereng (Tiruray), faglong (B’laan),
hegelong (T’boli) and kuglong or kudlong (Manobo).

The Magindanao kutyapi is one of the most technically demanding and difficult to master among
Filipino traditional instruments, which is one reason why the younger generation is not too keen
to learn it. Of its two strings, one provides the rhythmic drone, while the other has movable frets
that allow melodies to be played in two sets of pentatonic scales, one containing semitones, the
other containing none.

LANG DULAY (+2015)

Textile Weaver
T’boli
Lake Sebu, South Cotabato
1998

Using abaca fibers as fine as hair, Lang Dulay speaks more eloquently than words can. Images
from the distant past of her people, the Tbolis, are recreated by her nimble hands – the
crocodiles, butterflies and flowers, along with mountains and streams, of Lake Sebu, South
Cotabato, where she and her ancestors were born – fill the fabric with their longing to be
remembered. Through her weaving, Lang Dulay does what she can to keep her people’s
tradition alive.

There are a few of them left, the traditional weavers of the tnalak or Tboli cloth. It is not hard to
see why: weaving tnalak is a tedious process that begins with stripping the stem of the abaca
plant to get the fibers, to coaxing even finer fibers for the textile, then drying the threads and
tying each strand by hand. Afterwards, there is the delicate task of setting the strands on the
“bed-tying” frame made of bamboo, with an eye towards deciding which strands should be tied
to resist the dye. It is the bud or tying of the abaca fibers that defines the design.

SALINTA MONON (+ 2009)

Textile Weaver
Tagabawa Bagobo
Bansalan, Davao del Sur
1998

Practically, since she was born, Salinta Monon had watched her mother’s nimble hands glide
over the loom, weaving traditional Bagobo textiles. At 12 she presented herself to her mother, to
be taught how to weave herself. Her ardent desire to excel in the art of her ancestors enabled
her to learn quickly. She developed a keen eye for the traditional designs, and now, at the age
of 65, she can identify the design as well as the author of a woven piece just by a glance.

All her life she has woven continuously, through her marriage and six pregnancies, and even
after her husband’s death 20 years ago. She and her sister are the only remaining Bagobo
weavers in her community.
Her husband paid her parents a higher bride price because of her weaving skills. However, he
left all the abaca gathering and stripping to her. Instead, he concentrated on making their small
farm holding productive. Life was such that she was obliged to help out in the farm, often putting
her own work aside to make sure the planting got done and the harvest were brought in. When
her husband died, she was left alone with a farm and six children, but she continued with her
weaving, as a source of income as well as pride.

Salinta has built a solid reputation for the quality of her work and the intricacies of her designs.
There is a continuing demand for her fabrics. She has reached the stage where she is able to
set her own price, but she admits to a nagging sense of being underpaid nevertheless,
considering the time she puts into her work. It takes her three to four months to finish a fabric
3.5 m x 42 cm in length, or one abaca tube skirt per month.

ALONZO SACLAG
Musician and Dancer, Kalinga
Lubugan, Kalinga
2000

History, they say, is always written from the perspective of the dominant class. It is not as
objective an account as we were led to believe when, as elementary schoolchildren, we were
made to memorize the details of the lives of Jose Rizal and the other notable ilustrados. History
is about as impartial as the editorials we eagerly devour today, the ones that extol and chastise
the exploits and the foibles of government, but with a distinct advantage: by virtue of its form, it
takes on an aura of authority. And this authority is one ordinary schoolchildren and adults alike
are hardly likely to challenge.

Seemingly maligned by both history and popular media are the people of the Kalinga. Even in
the earliest Spanish Chronicles, they were depicted as so hostile that Dominican missionaries
were forced to abandon their plans to build Christian missions in the area. Their more recent
battle against the Marcos administration’s plans to build a series of hydroelectric dams along the
Chico River only added to their notoriety. The very name they have taken on was a label tagged
on to them by the neighboring Ibanag and Gaddang. It meant “enemy” – a throwback, no doubt,
to the days when head taking was a common and noble practice, intended not only to
demonstrate bravery but, more importantly, to safeguard lives and property.

Such was the emphasis placed on the fierceness of the Kalinga that, except for scholars,
researchers, and cultural workers, very few know about their rich culture and heritage. Which is
why the efforts of Alonzo Saclag, declared Manlilikha ng Bayan for 2000, become all the more
significant. A Kalinga master of dance and the performing arts, he has made it his mission to
create and nurture a greater consciousness and appreciation of Kalinga culture, among the
Kalinga themselves and beyond their borders.

As a young boy in Lubuagan, Kalinga, Alonzo Saclag found endless fascination in the sights
and sounds of day-to-day village life and ritual. According to his son, Robinson, he received no
instruction, formal or otherwise, in the performing arts. Yet he has mastered not only the Kalinga
musical instruments but also the dance patterns and movements associated with his people’s
rituals. His tool was observation, his teacher, experience. Coupled with these was a keen
interest in – a passion, if you would – the culture that was his inheritance.

FEDERICO CABALLERO
Epic Chanter
Sulod-Bukidnon
Calinog, Iloilo
2000

Stories are the lifeblood of a people. In the stories people tell lies a window to what they think,
believe, and desire. In truth, a people’s stories soundly encapsulate the essence of their
humanity. And this circumstance is not peculiar to any one group. It is as a thread that weaves
through the civilizations of the ancient East and the cultures of the industrial West.

So significant is the role they play that to poison a people’s stories, says African writer Ben Okri,
is to poison their lives. This truth resonates in the experience of many. In the folklore of the
Tagalog people, tales abound of a mythical hero who, once freed from imprisonment in a sacred
mountain, would come to liberate the nation. The crafty Spaniards seized upon this myth and
used it as a tool for further subjugation. They harped on it, enshrining it in the consciousness of
every Tagalog, dangling this legendary champion in front of their eyes as one would the
proverbial carrot. So insidious was this myth that suffering in silence and waiting for deliverance
became a virtue. And for a time, it lulled the people into a false sense of hope, smothering all
desire to rise up in arms.

Yet stories can also stir up a people long asleep, awaken senses that have lain dormant or been
dulled by the neglect of many centuries. Throughout history, not a few have expressed the belief
that the pen is more powerful than any sword, double-edged though it may be. Nonetheless,
that the purpose of stories is to change lives may not be immediately self-evident. But history, or
more significantly individual insight, stands witness to this truth. And perhaps it is partly this
realization that compels Federico Caballero, a Panay-Bukidnon from the mountains of Central
Panay to ceaselessly work for the documentation of the oral literature, particularly the epics, of
his people. These ten epics, rendered in a language that, although related to Kiniray-a, is no
longer spoken, constitute an encyclopedic folklore one only the most persevering and the most
gifted of disciples can learn. Together with scholars, artists, and advocates of culture, he
painstakingly pieces together the elements of this oral tradition nearly lost.

His own love for his people’s folklore began when he was a small child. His mother would lull his
brothers and sister to sleep, chanting an episode in time to the gentle swaying of the hammock.
Sometimes it was his great-great-grandmother, his Anggoy Omil, who would chant the epics.
Nong Pedring remembers how he would press against them as they cuddled his younger
siblings, his imagination recreating the heroes and beautiful maidens of their tales. In his mind,
Labaw Dunggon and Humadapnon grew into mythical proportions, heroes as real as the earth
on which their hut stood and the river that nourished it. Each night, he learned more about
where their adventures brought them, be it to enchanted caves peopled by charmed folk or the
underworld to rescue an unwitting prisoner from the clutches of an evil being. And the more he
learned, the greater his fascination became. When his mother or his Anggoy would inadvertently
nod off, he would beg them to stay awake and finish the tale.

His fascination naturally grew into a desire to learn to chant the epics himself. Spurred on by
this, he showed an almost enterprising facet: when asked by his Anggoy to fetch water from the
river, pound rice, or pull grass from the kaingin, he would agree to do so on the condition that he
be taught to chant an epic. Such audacity could very well have earned him a scolding. But it
was his earnestness that clearly shone through. Not long after, he conquered all ten epics and
other forms of oral literature, besides.

UWANG AHADAS
Musician
Yakan
Lamitan, Basilan
2000

Much mystery surrounds life. And when confronted with such, it is but natural to attempt some
form of hypothesizing. In the days when hard science was nonexistent, people sought to explain
away many of these enigmas by attributing them to the work of the gods or the spirits. In this
way, rain and thunder became the lamentations of a deity abandoned by his capricious wife,
and night and day, the compromise reached by a brother and sister who both wanted to rule the
world upon the death of their father.

Many of these heavenly beings hold sway over the earth and all that dwell within its bounds. In
the folklore of a northern people, a story explains why, in the three-kilometer stretch of the
highest peak of Binaratan, a mountain in the region, there is a silence so complete it borders on
the eerie. Legend has it that the great Kaboniyan went hunting with some men to teach them
how to train and use hounds. When they reached the peak of Binaratan, however, they could no
longer hear their hounds as the song of the birds drowned their barking. One of the hunters
begged Kaboniyan to stop the birds’ singing, lest the hunt fail and they return home empty-
handed. So Kaboniyan commanded the creatures of Binaratan to be silent in a voice so loud
and frightful that they kept their peace in fear. Since then, a strange unbroken silence reigns at
the top of the mountain, in spite of the multitudes of birds that flit from tree to tree.

And because they belong to this sphere, it is believed that mortal men are as vulnerable to the
powers and the whims of these gods and spirits as the beasts that roam the land and the birds
that sail the sky. Though they are hidden behind dark glasses, the eyes of Uwang Ahadas
speak of such a tale, one that came to pass more than half a century before. They tell story of a
young boy who unknowingly incurred the ire of the nature spirits through his childish play. The
people of his community believe Uwang’s near-blindness is a form of retribution from the nature
spirits that dwelled in Bohe Libaken, a brook near the place where he was born and where, as a
child, he often bathed. His father, Imam Ahadas, recalls that the five-year-old Uwang quietly
endured the pain in his eyes, waiting out a month before finally telling his parents.

Music was to become his constant companion. Uwang Ahadas is a Yakan, a people to whom
instrumental music is of much significance, connected as it is with both the agricultural cycle
and the social realm. One old agricultural tradition involves the kwintangan kayu, an instrument
consisting of five wooden logs hung horizontally, from the shortest to the longest, with the
shortest being nearest the ground. After the planting of the rice, an unroofed platform is built
high in the branches of a tree. Then the kwintangan kayu is played to serenade the palay, as a
lover woos his beloved. Its resonance is believed to gently caress the plants, rousing them from
their deep sleep, encouraging them to grow and yield more fruit.

DARHATA SAWABI (+ 2005)

Textile Weaver
Tausug
Parang, Sulu
2004

In Barangay Parang, in the island of Jolo , Sulu province, women weavers are hard at work
weaving the pis syabit, the traditional cloth tapestry worn as a head covering by the Tausug of
Jolo. “This is what we’ve grown up with,” say the weavers. “It is something we’ve learned from
our mothers.” Darhata Sawabi is one of those who took the art of pis syabit making to heart.

The families in her native Parang still depend on subsistence farming as their main source of
income. But farming does not bring in enough money to support a family, and is not even an
option for someone like Darhata Sawabi who was raised from birth to do only household chores.
She has never married. Thus, weaving is her only possible source of income. The money she
earns from making the colorful squares of cloth has enabled her to become self-sufficient and
less dependent on her nephews and nieces. A hand-woven square measuring 39 by 40 inches,
which takes her some three months to weave, brings her about P2,000. These squares are
purchased by Tausug for headpieces, as well as to adorn native attire, bags and other
accessories. Her remarkable proficiency with the art and the intricacy of her designs allows her
to price her creations a little higher than others. Her own community of weavers recognizes her
expertise in the craft, her bold contrasting colors, evenness of her weave and her faithfulness to
traditional designs.

Pis syabit weaving is a difficult art. Preparing the warp alone already takes three days. It is a
very mechanical task, consisting of stringing black and red threads across a banana and
bamboo frame to form the base of the tapestry. At 48, and burdened by years of hard work,
Sawabi no longer has the strength or the stamina for this. Instead, she hires one of the
neighboring children or apprentice weavers to do it at the cost of P300. It is a substantial
amount, considering the fact that she still has to spend for thread. Sawabi’s typical creations
feature several colors, including the basic black and red that form the warp, and a particular
color can require up to eight cones, depending on the role it plays in the design. All in all, it
comes up to considerable capital which she can only recover after much time and effort.

EDUARDO MUTUC
Metalsmith
Kapampangan
Apalit Pampanga
2004

Eduardo Mutuc is an artist who has dedicated his life to creating religious and secular art in silver,
bronze and wood. His intricately detailed retablos, mirrors, altars, and carosas are in churches
and private collections. A number of these works are quite large, some exceeding forty feet, while
some are very small and feature very fine and delicate craftsmanship.

For an artist whose work graces cathedrals and churches, Mutuc works in humble surroundings.
His studio occupies a corner of his yard and shares space with a tailoring shop. During the recent
rains, the river beside his lot overflowed and water flooded his studio in Apalit, Pampanga,
drenching his woodblocks. Mutuc takes it all in stride.
He discovered his talents in sculpture and metalwork quite late. He was 29 when he decided to
supplement his income from farming for the relatively more secure job of woodcarving. He spent
his first year as an apprentice to carvers of household furniture. It was difficult at the beginning,
but thanks to his mentors, he was able to develop valuable skills that would serve him in good
stead later on. The hardest challenge for him was learning a profession that he had no prior
knowledge about, but poverty was a powerful motivation. Although his daily wage of P3.00 didn’t
go far to support his wife and the first three of nine children (one of whom has already died),
choices were limited for a man who only finished elementary school.

HAJA AMINA APPI (+ 2013)

Mat Weaver
Sama
Tandubas, Tawi-Tawi
2004

Haja Amina Appi of Ungos Matata, Tandubas, Tawi-Tawi, is recognized as the master mat
weaver among the Sama indigenous community of Ungos Matata. Her colorful mats with their
complex geometric patterns exhibit her precise sense of design, proportion and symmetry and
sensitivity to color. Her unique multi-colored mats are protected by a plain white outer mat that
serves as the mat’s backing. Her functional and artistic creations take up to three months to
make.

The art of mat weaving is handed down the matrilateral line, as men in the Sama culture do not
take up the craft. The whole process, from harvesting and stripping down the pandan leaves to
the actual execution of the design, is exclusive to women. It is a long and tedious process, and
requires much patience and stamina. It also requires an eye for detail, an unerring color instinct,
and a genius for applied mathematics.

The process starts with the harvesting of wild pandan leaves from the forest. The Sama
weavers prefer the thorny leaf variety because it produces stronger and sturdier matting strips.
Although the thorns are huge and unrelenting, Haja Amina does not hesitate from gathering the
leaves. First, she removes the thorns using a small knife. Then, she strips the leaves with a
jangat deyum or stripper to make long and even strips. These strips are sun-dried, then pressed
(pinaggos) beneath a large log. She then dyes the strips by boiling them for a few minutes in hot
water mixed with anjibi or commercial dye. As an artist, she has refused to limit herself to the
traditional plain white mats of her forebears, but experimented with the use of anjibi in creating
her designs. And because commercial dyes are often not bold or striking enough for her taste,
she has taken to experimenting with color and developing her own tints to obtain the desired
hues. Her favorite colors are red, purple and yellow but her mats sometimes feature up to eight
colors at a time. Her complicated designs gain power from the interplay of various shades.

TEOFILO GARCIA
Casque Maker
Ilocano
San Quintin, Abra
2012

Each time Teofilo Garcia leaves his farm in San Quintin, Abra, he makes it a point to wear a
tabungaw. People in the nearby towns of the province, in neighboring Sta. Maria and Vigan in
Ilocos Sur, and as far as Laoag in Ilocos Norte sit up and take notice of his unique, functional and
elegant headpiece that shields him from the rain and the sun. A closer look would reveal that it is
made of the native gourd, hollowed out, polished, and varnished to a bright orange sheen to
improve its weather resistance. The inside is lined with finely woven rattan matting, and the brim
sports a subtle bamboo weave for accent.

Because he takes pride in wearing his creations, Teofilo has gotten many orders as a result.
Through his own efforts, through word of mouth, and through his own participation in an annual
harvest festival in his local Abra, a lot of people have discovered about the wonders of the
tabungaw as a practical alternative. Hundreds have sought him out at his home to order their own
native all-weather headgear. His clients have worn his work, sent them as gifts to their relatives
abroad, and showed them off as a masterpiece of Filipino craftsmanship. With the proper care, a
well-made tabungaw can last up to three to four generations, and the ones created by Teofilo are
among the best there are. They are so sturdy that generally, farmers need to own only one at a
time. Even Teofilo and his son only own one tabungaw each.

MAGDALENA GAMAYO
Textile Weaver
 Ilocano
Pinili, Ilocos Norte
2012

The Ilocos Norte that Magdalena Gamayo knows is only a couple of hours drive away from the
capital of Laoag, but is far removed from the quickening pulse of the emergent city. Instead, it
remains a quiet rural enclave dedicated to rice, cotton and tobacco crops. 2012 Gawad sa
Manlilikha ng Bayan awardee, Magdalena Gamayo still owes a lot to the land and the annual
harvest. Despite her status as a master weaver, weaving alone is not enough.

Also, even though the roads are much improved, sourcing quality cotton threads for her abel is
still a challenge. Even though the North is known for its cotton, it does not have thread factories
to spin bales of cotton into spools of thread. Instead, Magdalena has to rely on local merchants
with their limited supplies. She used to spin her own cotton and brushed it with beeswax to make
it stronger, but after the Second World War, she now relies on a market-bought thread. She still
remembers trading rice for thread, although those bartering days are over. A thread is more
expensive nowadays and of poorer quality. Often, she has had to reject samples but often she
has little choice in the matter. There are less local suppliers of thread nowadays, a sign that there
is less demand for their wares, but nonetheless, the abel-weaving tradition in Ilocos remains
strong, and there are no better artists who exemplify the best of Filipino abel weaving tradition
than Magdalena Gamayo.

She says good thread has to be resilient, able to withstand several passes through the loom. It
should have a good weight and color, its fibers should not be loose, and it should endure years
of use. Magdalena prefers to work with linen because it is obedient to the master weaver’s
touch. In her personal collection are abel that has been in use for generations, gradually getting
softer from handling, but retaining their structural integrity and intricate designs. Evident is the
handiwork that went into painstakingly arranging bolts of different-colored threads on the four-
pedal loom and the math that went with it to ensure that the patterns are sharp and crisp and
evenly spaced.

AMBALANG AUSALIN
Textile Weaver, 2016
(born 4 March 1943)

By Earl Francis C. Pasilan

The Yakan of Basilan are known to be among the finest weavers in the Southern Philippines.
They create eye-catching and colorful textiles with tiny motifs, and possess techniques wielded
only by seasoned weavers accomplishing designs restricted for utilization within a certain weaving
category only.

Weaving is an extremely important craft in the Yakan community. All Yakan women in the past
were trained in weaving. Long ago, a common practice among the Yakan was that, when a female
was born, the pandey, traditional midwife, would cut the umbilical cord using a wooden bar
called bayre (other Yakan pronounce this as beyde). That bar was used for ‘beating-in’ the weft
of the loom. By thus severing of the umbilical cord, it was believed that the infant would grow up
to become an accomplished weaver. This, and all other aspects of the Yakan weaving tradition,is
best personified by a seventy-three-year-old virtuoso from the weaving domicile of the Yakan in
Parangbasak, Lamitan City: Ambalang Ausalin.

Apuh Ambalang, as she is called by her community of weavers, is highly esteemed in all of
Lamitan. Her skill is deemed incomparable: she is able to bring forth all designs and actualize all
textile categories typical to the Yakan. She can execute the suwah bekkat (cross-stitch-like
embellishment) and suwah pendan (embroidery-like embellishment) techniques of the bunga
sama category. She possesses the complex knowledge of the entire weaving process, aware at
the same time of the cultural significance of each textile design or category. As a young girl, her
mother, who was the best weaver of her time, mentored Ambalang. She practiced with strips
of lugus and coconut leaves (mat-making material). Having learned from her mother the expert,
Ambalang, using the backstrap loom, started to weave all designs of the bunga sama category,
then took on the sinalu’an and the seputangan, two of the most intricate categories in Yakan
weaving. They are the most intricate since the former requires the use of the minutest details of
diamond or rhomboid designs, and the latter demands balance and the filling up of all the spaces
on the warp with pussuk labung and dinglu or mata-mata patterns.
 ESTELITA BANTILAN
Mat Weaver, 2016
(born 17 October 1940)

By Marian Pastor Roces

She was at birth, seventy-two years ago, Labnai Tumndan. It was a recognizable name in the
language, Blaan, spoken in the montane hamlet of Mlasang. Her extended family reckoned their
place in relation to the mlasang, a tree that, once a year, flowers profusely, sheds the
inflorescences immediately, and carpets abode and environmentin magnificence all at once.

Mid-twentieth century in what are now the Mindanao provinces of Sarangani and South Cotabato,
Blaan speakers — also called Blaan, like their language — took on the slow beginning of village
life of some permanence. Their forebears had for centuries shifted domiciles systematically to
regenerate land cultivated to wild rice and yams. Around the time of Labnai’s childhood, the small
community understood their link to the Philippine political system to be vested in the new identity
of Mlasang as Upper Lasang, a barangay of the municipality of Malapatan, in a province called
Cotabato. Shortly after, this province was subdivided and Malapatan was absorbed into the new
province of Sarangani.

The child Labnai, already precocious in mat weaving, took on the name Estelita in the 1950s.
Protestant pastors had installed themselves among her people, had commenced fundamental
social change. When Estelita married, becoming Mrs. Bantilan, she raised a family in the foreign
faith.

YABING MASALON DULO

Ikat Weaver, 2016
(born 8 August 1914)

By Marian Pastor Roces

A century

Yabing Dulo believes herself older than ninety. Her identity card marks that age, however, and
date of birth, the fourteenth of August supposedly 1910. Since the venerable ikat-dyer has a
memory sharper than blades, it seems always best to follow her counsel. She does know for a
fact that she was born in a place already called Landan in that long ago time. The exact sitio was
and is still named Amgu-o, a settlement of a few related families within Landan, today a barangay,
a constituent unit of a town. During the early twentieth century, Amgu-o was a cluster of houses
thoroughly unconnected to the national political organization. It was a hilly, forested place where
streams were punctuated by all sizes of rocks. The trees, then, were ancient.

Now ancient as well — accepting the honorific Fu, elder, with no hauteur — Fu Yabing has lived
long enough to have seen Amgu-o emerge as an exposed, dry place sans those trees. Her thatch-
wood-concrete domicile speaks of a permanence unconnected to the archaic system of shifting
agriculture that gave its practitioners to move entire hamlets following the obligation to regenerate
soil after extended use; giving that land back to the forest. Today, visitors reach Fu Yabing on
foot, or by motorcycle, or a four-wheel drive vehicle through pockmarked dirt passes; although it
must be added, they are not overly daunted. Landan is connected to the rest of the country by
feeder roads, however flimsy, and through the national political order, however tenuous in these
parts.

It may indeed be suggested that it is Fu Yabing and her art that is unconnected to the relevant
order of things. They have been loosened free from their old coordinates in both nature and
culture. Living in radically different circumstances from her arboreal birthplace, among a people
who in that past engaged in precise reciprocal instead of market relations, she carries on with an
exquisite tradition that at present grafts poorly with the cash economy. But she has always faced
the disjunct between systems by deploying her gift: the expert making of fine warp ikat textiles.
With the GAMABA (Gawad sa Manlilikha ng Bayan) recognition, it is clear she has prevailed.

LOOM

noun
1. an apparatus for making fabric by weaving yarn or thread.
 folk·lore
Dictionary result for folklore

/ˈfōklôr/
noun
1. the traditional beliefs, customs, and stories of a community, passed through the generations by
word of mouth.
synonyms: mythology, lore, oral history, tradition, folk tradition; More
o a body of popular myth and beliefs relating to a particular place, activity, or group of people.
"Hollywood folklore"