My inspiration for this artwork was Hernando Ocampo’s ‘Dancing Mutants’ (1965), who was a Filipino neorealist artist. Along with other neorealists, he tried to take a more abstract approach to art. I was heavily impressed with his approach, and execution, as well as the colours and shapes he has used. In his artwork, there are very contrasting colours, which are striking. There is a clear sense of depth and movement, which is presented by the angular,
flowing shapes.

The painting reacts to the horrors of the atomic bomb dropped in the Philippines in December 1956 and is reminiscent of the Philippine flora and fauna after the disaster. Ocampo was inspired by a movie titled ‘The Beginning Of The End’, where the animals mutate due to the effects of an atomic bomb. This idea and sense of war is echoed in my artwork with the contrast in colours and symbols. The numbers 0, 2, 6, 6, 9 are scattered across the painting. This refers to the number my grandfather was allotted in Joining Service in the Indian Armed Forces. He was a Lieutenant General, medical corps. The stars in the background of the painting represent the medal he was awarded by the president of India, the Param Vishisht Seva Medal, or PVSM. The star mimics the star on the award itself, and the red rectangle you can see above two of them represents the ribbon.

The long bright red rectangles dotted on the painting are soldiers, standing uniform and in line. I deliberately chose the colour red specifically for this, as to me it mimics the physical toll of war on the human body- wounds, cuts, bruises etc. and I used a stamp to create the shape, because it makes the shape messier, not whole or torn up.

The colour palette is heavily drawn from Ocampo’s original, with the greens and reds, and differences in the lightness of the colours. Wars are a messy, horrible time to live through, and I have captured that with the messy layering of different colours when making just one symbol, to add to the rustic and imperfect feel, making this painting a personal recreation of Hernando Ocampo’s ‘Dancing Mutants’