Kenneth John Montegrande did not always envision to become an artist, yet despite excelling in his other callings; as a member of the press, as a public relations professional, and later, as a spokesperson to the Department of Tourism’s National Parks Development Authority, painting beckoned him to become the artist that he is now. The thought that his works “Abstrak” and “Enigmatic Series II” would be included in the collections of the mega art collector Yusaku Maezawa, who collects Basquiat, Bruce Nauman, Alexander Calder, Jeff Koons, or his “Transfigurings of Freshest Blue” and “Perla del Mar de Oriente” would be in the company of works by Sorolla, Luna, and Amorsolo, in the collection of the Malacañang Museum in 2019, certainly surprised him. Painting and art was far from his reality, when as a child, he had to sell snacks in Ermita to supplement their family income.
