Brut Collective, composed of Reb Belleza, Ron Lopez Davis, and David Kaufman, returns to J Studio in Makati for Exhibit Two, opening July 27. Each artist works independently, but their proximity fosters an exchange of contrasts and connections.
The name comes from Jean Dubuffet’s Art Brut, a term for art guided by instinct over convention. According to Dubuffet: “Art addresses itself to the mind, not to the eyes”— emphasizing that Art Brut was about inner necessity rather than surface appeal or formal training. His vision celebrated creative acts free from refinement or institutional expectations. For Brut Collective, it reflects a process grounded in immediacy and intuition.
Belleza started painting on film sets as a child. Susan Roces gave him crayons, and Fernando Poe Jr. bought one of his early abstract works. That early validation shaped his direction. He often begins with a word or feeling and lets repetition carry the work forward. In his 2018 series Mga Liham Para Kay Ina, he created visual letters to maternal figures. In Laughing Boy, blurred faces shift between openness and disguise.
Davis works in a quieter key. Raised in the once Bohemian district of Malate and later based in San Francisco, he studied business and fine art, cooked professionally, and joined artist-run spaces. His paintings begin with a single mark or tone and unfold slowly. In Blue Morning Light, a reclining figure fades into the background. Davis responds to the image as it develops, allowing process to shape outcome.
Kaufman works with weight and rhythm. Influenced by Jackson Pollock and trained in construction and stonework, he builds dense surfaces using salvaged pigment, stone, and debris. His forms emerge through layered marks, shaped by memory and movement. He divides his time between Manila and Madrid, where he is developing a shared studio for cross-disciplinary artists.
Since their debut in 2024, Brut Collective has shown at Qube Gallery in Cebu, where low lighting slowed the pace of viewing, and at Spin Gallery in Antipolo, where spatial design guided how viewers engaged the work. On EDSA, their images briefly appeared on digital billboards, offering a pause from the heavy commercial noise and traffic.
“We don’t have to say the same thing,” Davis said. Belleza added, “We build on what’s already there.” For Kaufman, “Instinct still matters.”
After Exhibit Two, the trio will present work at Artologist Gallery in Shangri-La Plaza, another group show in October, and to Alto Mondo’s Makati gallery.
Brut Collective’s work resists quick resolutions. Some images linger or return over time. Belleza’s iconography, Davis’s surfaces, and Kaufman’s textures remain distinct yet resonate in relation. The viewing unfolds through contrast and leaves space for memory, emotion, and reflection. What stays with the viewer completes the work.
