Artist paints images of volcanic devastation using ash
TANAUAN — Ash from the rumbling Taal volcano has inspired an artist and instructor to paint watercolors using the gray powder that had covered the plants in her backyard.
Janina Sanico, who lives in the town of Tanauan, Batangas near the volcano, collected the ash, mixed it with water and binder, and started painting images, some of them depicting the devastation caused by the small but dangerous volcano.
“So that was the pain that I felt. So when I saw the animals, that’s where I got my inspiration for my paintings”, said the 24-year-old Ms. Sanico.
More than 140,000 people evacuated after Taal, one of the country’s most active volcanoes, erupted on Jan. 12, blanketing homes, schools, and farms with ash.
Sanico, a promoter of natural pigment water colors, said she has been selling her paintings and donating the profits to help thousands of people who had been displaced.
“Since this ash came from the earth, I experimented and I studied. Then when I posted my artwork on social media, I found that it was widely received by people,” said Ms. Sanico.
She has used different mediums such as coffee for painting before, but ash, she said, surprisingly worked well enough as long as it had enough water.
Volcanologists have lowered the danger level of Taal at 4 out of a possible 5, allowing people to return to their homes around the volcano except for those within a seven-kilometer danger zone.
At just 311 meters high, Taal is one of the world’s smallest active volcanoes. It killed more than 1,300 people in an eruption in 1911. — Reuters
