…This sculptor seem hell bent on foresting the Philippines, if not this entire planet, with welded brass sheet structures. It has become an obsession - this planting of brass icons all over the archipelago. Financial rewards does not appear to be the moving factor: in the economies of scale he can make more money doing smaller pieces, especially jewellery for far less effort and headache. For these public monuments, he does in fact, offer creative contribution and his labor free, provided that the community or local government assume the cost of materials and other logistics. His ideas for these public monuments only get bigger and bigger, to the point where he is now earnestly flogging complete plans and blueprint for a welded brass monument that could house a museum or chapel inside its base while its apex could serve as a beacon light for aircraft.

But there is more to Castrillo than these imposing public monuments. His more portable sculptures in oxidized brass or chrome decorate homes and offices. He is also the creator of hammerout bas-reliefs in brass and silver which have extracted praise from critics for their craftsmanship and social commentary. Sculptured doors, tables and chairs, garden sculptures that play with fountains of water and move with the wind, colored panes of stained glass or acrylic, commemorative medallions cast from dies, silver sports trophies and religious chalices - all these and more have emerged from his bony hands; Yet another facet of this versatile sculptor s his flair for ultra-chic silver jewellery. It was after all, as a jewellery designer for La Estrella del Norte that Castrillo began his meteoric rise as an artist. Some may say that his gigantic monuments are merely jewellery design writ large; or are his jewellery pieces the stuff of monuments compressed into the sculptor's list?

Whether as jewelsmith or monument maker, Castrillo has introduced new ideas and new technologies to the Philippine scene. Herculean physical and technological obstacles have not daunted him, not even the most awesome of all ogres in the country, the bandstand of government officials whose approval and cooperation must be gained to complete each and everyone of his public sculptures. It will probably be some time before the general public and the art establishment will be able to fully digest and assess the scope and scale of Castrillo's accomplishments of more than three decades. For the sheer number of monuments, for the total tonnage of metal put into all of these, for the geographic proliferation of these sculptured pieces, and for the staggering amount of pesos and centavos expended, Castrillo has to take the prize among all the Filipino artists of his time.

Castrillo has a long way to go to match the grandeur of Angkor, a city-kingdom created in one specific site. On the other hand, the diversity and distribution of Castrillo's metal structures, their geographical spread, may be seen as a plus viewed from a grander scheme, enough evidence to suggest that he is on his way to getting there. The sum total of Castrillo's accomplishment to date, dispersed as they are, does "boggle the mind." And his waking hours these days are given to striving mightily towards founding a sculptural Camelot, to turn fantastic obsession into a brass-city. Indeed he may just perhaps "pull it off."

Other than an artist, Castrillo has been active in the art scene in various capacities; for some years he shared his knowledge and experience with students as a faculty member of the College of Fine Arts at the University of the Philippines and as an artist-in-residence of the Far Eastern University. For six years he held the presidency of the Art Association of the Philippines (AAP), and simultaneously served as representative for the Visual Arts of UNESCO's National Commission on Culture in the country.

…Whether art critics and aestheticians like it or not, Castrillo has shaped our cultural landscape by arousing public awareness to public art, to significant monuments of a country's history, and to the aesthetics of metal sculpture and its immediate surrounds.

Download PDF format of the whole document