'Kuya Robert's' Bottle of Cheers

Necessity could bring out creativity. Forty-one-year old Robert Alejandro has known this fact since when he was only knee-high.

“I remember that when I was a child, my siblings and I did not have many toys,” Alejandro said in Filipino. “So we would always make our own. I had a sister who loved paper dolls.”

In the environment where creativity was advocated, Alejandro thrived as an artist. He became a children’s book illustrator and a computer graphics artist.

His cheerfulness and vivacity earned him a spot in a television art-workshop show titled “art is-kool,” where he came to be known as “Kuya Robert.” He candidly admits that he was not comfortable to be in front of the camera, but he loved to share his knowledge with the kids.

“My motivation then was my producer saying to me, ‘it’s for the children,’” he said.

The best part of his job was when he gets letters from the children sharing their joy of art and art-making.

As he himself started young, Alejandro likes to nurture this excitement in them. He remembers how he used to make something out of things that was meant to be thrown away. This soon became his trademark.

“I like to use inexpensive materials,” he said. “I use materials that you don’t have to buy especially for the project.”

He prefers it if people sees his project and say to themselves “Hey, I have materials just like this at home. I can replicate this.”

Otherwise, he says, what’s the point? After all, he wants to encourage people to be creative not repel them. He strongly believes that the more the materials are available to them, the more they would want to try it on their own.

Of late, Kuya Robert has become enamored with the new egg-shaped bottles of Lady's Choice Sandwich Spread, turning them into elegant jars of art. Obviously, he’s one guy who doesn’t stop at recreating available materials. And how he does it in style.

With colored cartolinas, art papers and a few illustrations, the new Lady's Choice jars became containers for marshmallows, candies and cookies with animal heads, Christmas trees and even Santa Claus.

“The most important thing is that you have fun. As long as you have fun, you can’t go wrong and you can’t commit mistakes,” he said.

One of his more interesting pieces is the jar-o-rama or a diorama inside a jar. He drew the trees and birds inside the bottle with a bumblebee on the outside.

He said such pieces could easily become a family activity that even children as young as four-year–old could participate in the project by drawing. While cutting it into shapes and hanging it inside the bottle could be performed by the parents.

He emphasized that such undertaking is a perfect time to bond with the whole family. He’s one firm believer that a good person is formed during the childhood stages. And the main part of being a child is the parents.

“Children will not forget such moments ever in their life,” he said.

More than your average arts and crafts teacher, Kuya Robert is also a builder of good memories.