Elito Circa

Elito Villaflor Circa (born January 28, 1970), better known as "Amangpintor", is a Filipino painter and internationally known folk artist, who paints using his hair and blood fluids with mythologism and subject matters. His signature subject is Legend of Minggan.
Early life and education
Amangpintor was born to Juan Llagas Circa and Josefina Salazar Villaflor in the old town of Pantabangan, Nueva Ecija, Philippines on January 28, 1970. He was the youngest of seven children. His education was funded through a scholarship from World Vision Foundation
Amangpintor has no formal training in painting. He started drawing, using charcoals from the stove in their kitchen, on the walls of their house in Pantabangan town when he was eight years old. He completed an estimated 600 works of art since 1980, which he gave to some of his teachers, friends and neighbors during that time. He also painted a series of 15 paintings for the "Legend of Minggan" which depicted the courtship of the giant "Minggan" to "Mariang Sinukuan" who was supposed to be dwelling in Mount Arayat. Amangpintor also made a series of paintings about the place of his birth, depicted about the evacuation of the residents of Pantabangan when their town was about to be submerged by Pantabangan Dam. as a gesture of dedicating of life in this noble profession of educating the youth. The 1001 teachers and DepEd employees was participated and literally donated parts of their body, their hair and blood incorporated in the mural.
Influence
Amangpintor influenced many other Filipino painters for using indigenous materials or natural raw materials as paint such as extract from onion, tomato, tuba, coffee, rust, molasses and other materials available anywhere. Many artists have been inspired and from then on, artists have started to use indigenous materials in their works. Human blood as medium has also influenced the American artist Vincent Castiglia.The finger and hand painting performance also influenced other young visual artists especially students.
Indigenouism
The term Indigenouism was coined by Elito Circa who led the movement of using indigenous materials for paintings and introduced it to other artists since 1993. It was during the heat of the campaign against global warming in 1993.
He believes his most significant contributions to the history of art were in collaboration with Indigenouism in 2007, and the role he played in the development of Indigenouism.<ref nameindi /><ref namegoodnews1 />

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