About
The Artist and Malaya Designs: Ray Haguisan
I am an artist who specializes in a technique called Pyrography “writing with fire” using a woodburning tool. My art is primarily focused on the use of the ancient Philippine script, the Baybayin, and have been an avid Baybayin practitioner and artist since 1993.
The Brand That Started It All…
jaye
October 17, 2010 at 7:11 pm
my daughter’s name is malaya and i was hoping you could help me by giving me her name in baybayin. id like to get the translation for a tattoo dedicated to her.
malayadesigns
October 28, 2010 at 9:18 pm
Greetings,
Thanks for your interest in my work. My sincerest apologies for such a tardy email response but WordPress doesn’t seem to be cooperating with email forwarding. I’d be happy to do a transliteration for you. Would you like to have Malaya written horizontally, left to right or vertical, top to bottom? Also, where is the proposed placement for the body art?
Ray
Lisa
November 1, 2010 at 8:52 am
Hi Ray,
It was nice re-connecting with you a couple weeks ago at Bayanihan. Wanted to stay in touch and see if we could do some collab metal and kawayan pieces.
Also, the org I am a part of is having a fundraiser on Nov 14, and I’d like to see if you’d like to donate some of your pieces and table if you’d like….
Let me know,
Lisa J.
Sunshine
November 11, 2010 at 1:00 pm
Hi Ray,
I emailed you the other day, but I thought I might try this to let you know I am really interested in a couple of alibata pendants. Let me know if you are still creating these and if you have a collection of words to choose from or if I can submit my own.
Thanks for sharing your great artwork, I look forward in hearing from you soon.
Sunshine
Charisse
January 17, 2011 at 3:05 pm
Hi, thank you for sharing this wonderful art of yours. This really amaze me. Specially now that i want to have a tattoo, but i want it to be written in ALIBATA. Would you mind translating a word/sentence for me? Uhm, the pendant… are you selling that? Can it be personalize? Please let me know as soon as you can reply to this message
SALAMAT PO!
John Doyle
May 30, 2011 at 12:24 pm
Dear Sir….
Sorry for such a long email.
Each year I research and write an extensive educational Curriculum Guide for the Memphis in May International Festival, which honors a different country each year. In 2012, Memphis in May will be honoring the Republic of the Philippines, with a month of exhibits, performances, demonstrations, etc. The Curriculum Guide is distributed to all K-12 grade schools throughout the Memphis area for teachers to use to teach their students about the honored country. An online version of the 2011 Guide honoring Belgium can be viewed at http://www.memphisinmay.org/curriculumguide
I am amazed at your designs, and intrigued that they incorporate the ancient Philippine Baybayin script, and that the jewelry utilizes traditional Philippine materials like bamboo and mahogany. You can see on the Guide honoring Belgium that, each year when I develop one of these guides for Memphis in May, I utilize some iconic symbols, graphics or emblems to designate between the 6 different divisions of the book (Intro. Grades k-2, Grades 3-5, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, and Info). For Belgium, I had to settle on different shapes of traditional Belgium chocolate. Several years ago for Costa Rica, I used different creatures from the rainforest (butterfly, gecko, tree frog, etc.). While I want the icons to be unique to the country, I try to keep them from being unpreferably stereotypical (like a “camel” for Morocco).
I would love to utilize 6 of your graphic designs… just like the Malaya Designs logo below. They are simple, beautiful, truly representational of the Philippines, and, I suspect, would appropriately express a country’s pride. The shape and dimensions of your logo are perfect, as well, because its slightly vertical design would allow each symbol to fit nicely in the top corner of each page. If you are willing, I would also like to incorporate one of your full-color designs, or a photo of one of your pendants, on the 4-color cover of the Curriculum Guide. While Memphis in May is a not-for-profit organization, and the budget is limited for the creation of this Curriculum Guide, I would certainly be willing to pay you for the 6 high-res artwork designs and for a full-color version or high-res photo of one of your pendants for the cover.
Additionally, while I do not currently work directly on the Festival staff (I used to be their Vice President of International Programming), if you are interested I would like to pass your name along to the current VP of Programming. It would be such a great addition to their Festival if they would consider bringing you to Memphis one weekend next May to demonstrate the unique BayBayin writing style… or to purchase your pendants for VIP gifts for Fetsival Board members and sponsors.
Thank you for your consideration about the artwork. Unfortunatley, I am working on a fairly tight deadline, as Memphis in May would like for me to deliver the finished Guide to them by July 1 so that it can be reviewed by the Philippine Embassy in Washington DC and then be printed in time for the Fall school year.
Thank you again for your consideration.
Sincerely,
John Doyle
barkingdogagency@bellsouth.net
(901) 485-6995
ron
November 8, 2011 at 8:31 pm
Is there a specific way you would write baybayin? i’ve seen a bunch of different fonts that have been derived from the original traditional way. but i’m curious to know from the ones you have on your blog if there is a way you write them particularly.
malayadesigns
November 8, 2011 at 9:57 pm
In regards to the Baybayin characters, you can write them any way you want. You don’t necessarily need to write the characters exactly how everyone else writes it. Once you are familiar with the characters, you eventually develop your own writing style.