ON THE FRINGES: The IPAG Story
Film documentary chronicling the growth of the most-travelled Philippine performing company from its beginnings in 1978. This full-feature AV narrates the timeline of the IPAG from its simple homegrown origins to its significant position in Philippine performance practice and production after over four decades.
Introductions from significant personalities of Philippine Performance
“…kagiliw-giliw ang mga eksena…” Bienvenido Lumbera, NATIONAL ARTIST FOR LITERATURE
The Integrated Performing Arts Guild (IPAG) has significantly contributed to a nationally robust culture-and-arts environment. As catalyst that has enhanced a consciousness for Philippine Arts, IPAG has spread out its influences that cover creative production, education, craft enhancement, the management of creative resources, and social advocacy.
IPAG— the Philippines’ most-travelled repertory company— has engaged thousands around the country and the globe. In over four decades, it has used the performing arts to link peoples and cultures. Its celebrated repertoire has performed in most parts of the Philippines and in over a hundred cities, among these in Hawaii, the U.S. Mainland, Europe, and Asia enthralling large audiences and building goodwill for the Philippines.
Its prodigious rave reviews, awards, and acclamation of a storied 40+ years as a major ensemble is non-paralleled.
IPAG’s prominence as one of the more dynamic performance companies in the Philippines today is well acknowledged. It presents a Theatre characterized by a distinguishable form, of movement, color, poetry, rhythm, and a presence that captivates.
This timeline chronicles the Guild’s history. In it, parts synch like spokes of a wheel all connecting to a hub. Strong spokes turn in unison. But this is only one wheel where balance is precarious. To keep the cart steady, strong, and fast, three other wheels keep in synch with the first ensuring that the cart moves forward towards its destination.
Productions.
IPAG has drawn acclamation for its innovative productions that integrate dance, music, literature, and the visual arts. Its productions are created from the Hispanic, Islamic, native and cosmopolitan artistic expressions of the southern Philippines where it is based.
Its signature dance idiom is based on the pangalay, inspired from the dances of the Sulu Archipelago (introduced by its Founding Chairperson Ligaya Fernando-Amilbangsa) where the performer in motions of the hands and body like the sea seem to glide through space.
Participating in major cultural events here and abroad, IPAG was main featured in the CCP National Theater Festivals, the many festivals of the International Organization of Folk Art (IOV) and CIOFF, the 2006 Hawaii-U.S. Centennial events, the Washington DC International Dance Festival, the CCP National Drama Competitions (where it won), and the UNESCO-ITI Asia Pacific Bureau of Theatre Schools in Taipei, Ho Chi Minh, Shanghai, and Singapore.
In the Port-sur-Saone Festival in France, IPAG emerged as the winningest country among 12 other foreign representatives.
IPAG headlined a command performance for Prince Albert in Monaco presenting its productions to dignitaries and the upper-class 400 of this luxurious municipality. The resort-town of Lech in Innsbruck high in the Alps main featured the IPAG as it celebrated 700 years of its founding.
From Simple Beginnings
The Guild was founded in 1978 by its Artistic Director Steven P.C. Fernandez and dance researcher Amilbangsa, its founding Chairperson. Amilbangsa was awarded the 2015 Ramon Magsaysay Prize (the Asian Nobel); Fernandez was feted with the highest UMPIL distinction, the Pambansang Gawad Balagtas by the Writers Union of the Philippines in both English and Filipino.
IPAG productions have won the Palanca, CCP Gantimpala, CCP Pilak, U.P. Likhaan, the SM Global Pinoy, among others.
IPAG has been featured in international and national media. Notably among these are the 2004 Philippine Yearbook of the Fookien Times, Living Asia-Isla documentary, Knowledge Channel, LA18 TV, the CCP Encyclopedia of Philippine Art (both first and latest editions), the Harvard Asian Quarterly, Xtreme Singapore syndicated TV, in numerous TV features, anthologies, and in most national broadsheets.
Its Sita: The Ramayana Revisited drew acclaim in India, Thailand, and Singapore. After impressing world leaders in the INDIA-ASEAN Summit in New Delhi and Kolkata, Sita continued to wow the Mumbai community with its unique version of the Ramayana. Impressive responses have guaranteed their continued journeys around Asia.
Its string of standing ovations in its two coast-to-coast US road shows has been left unbroken in 19 full-feature performances.
In 2020, the CCP awarded IPAG with the Gador, adding to its roster including the UMPIL Pambangsang Gawad Pedro Bukaneg and CCP’s highest distinction, the Gawad.
