PAST EXHIBITIONS
2018
Bigkis| January
Darby Vincent Alcoseba, Leonard Aguinaldo, Manny Garibay, Demet Dela Cruz, Jun Impas, Jason Moss, Othoniel Neri, and Orley Ypon
The Durian Collective murals are reimagining of historical events and everyday scenes, and contain nuanced visual stories of what it means to be a Filipino in specific geographies and epochs. Each mural has a premise and vividness that reflects the immersive process employed by the collective in the creation of each work. Hence, we encounter a rich rendition of the vegetable market in La Trinidad, Benguet, a shallow dive into the lives of the first Filipino settlers in Louisiana, and a satirical sweep of the rotting local political system.
Linear| January
Sam Penaso
Sam Penaso’s opening solo exhibition for 2018, features a wide array of his works from sculpture to abstract painting. The use of geometric lines and shapes, as well as vibrantly contrasting psychedelic colors, offer a view of the artist’s creative process in his more than two decades' journey into art. Penaso’s recent works incorporate numbers and letters in Linear as he expresses his sequential development in terms of technique and use of media. As in his Stripewalker performance action and photography series, each piece is imbued with high energy, intense saturations of color and deliberate exploration of the limits of his art practice.
Ugnayan sa Poblacion | January
Henri Lamy. Abdoul Seck, Chufy, Alexandra Beretta & Khwezi Strydom
The five international artists exhibited were selected as part of the artist residency program “Ugnayan sa Poblacion”, an initiative held by the French art center Taverne Gutenberg. Founded by French-Filipina designer Maïa d’Aboville and French painter Henri Lamy, Taverne Gutenberg is an established creative hub that has exhibited over 400 artists and has gathered over 30,000 visitors since its birth in 2015 in Lyon, France. The artists of “Ugnayan sa Poblacion” have a mission to promote and share art in order to make it accessible to Filipinos, especially street children from disadvantaged backgrounds.
The Points of Origin | February
Aiya Balingit, Lawrence Canto, Keb Cerda, Ronson Culibrina, Dale Erispe, Johanna Helmuth, John Marin, Pow Marin, Yeo Kaa, and Yani Unsana
The artists trace their roots and intimate the ideas of home and belonging through a variety of media that showcase their signature styles—from paintings and photographs to installations and mixed media works. Images of domestic spaces, self-portraits, and distinct locales animated by deep sentiments, symbolic and expressive language are brought together to give meaning to the artist’s origins and look back at what have so far transpired in their lives as artists and individuals.
Fraction| February
Lendl Arvin, Kiko Urquiola & Gian Miroe
The divergence of the three artists reveals an intricate truth: each one has the ability to choose what makes him whole. They are responsible for connecting the chapters that narrate their lives, broken down by fractions that matter the most. The objects, people, memories, and decisions one is aware of reflect the things he values at present—which may change tomorrow, next year, in the next decade, or in another life. Or they may never change.
Pre- Departure| March
Julio Jose Austria
New York-based Filipino artist Julio Jose Austria is no stranger to the built-up uncertainties pervading this transitory space. “Pre-Departure” reveals the artist closely looking at the structure—both at its concrete and invisible walls—that has silently become integral to his life since he left the Philippines. From the moment he first set foot in New York City in 2009 to his yearly visits back home, Austria has undergone the grueling procedures from tourist to immigrant, foreigner to resident. In this exhibit, fingerprints, barcodes, and surveillance technology embedded on layers of thick, expressionist strokes expose standards intended to secure, while questioning whom they continue to serve and restrict.
While No One's Here| February
Lymuel Bautista, Mccoy Lazaruz, Alexis Marga & Steven Natal
As these artists are open to experimentation to art, they still value that paintings should be fully embodied and that their social function is not to be ignored as painting for painting’s sake. Assuring a bright positive direction, While No One’s Here devotes an alternative way of looking at visual arts. It is an understanding that may enrich your life, as it has indeed on these participating artists. While No One’s Here is also who they are when everyone is watching.
Eavesdrop| March
Adriana Cruzat, Ayra Sayat, Celine Lee, Claudine Delfin, Gab Baez, Kristinen Caguiat, Leny Leonor, Mariah Sarah Orlina, Mikhaela Marie, Shalimar Gonzaga & Suzette Tan
Terminal| March
Kim Gaceja, PJ Andayran, Clark Manalo, Mark Martinez, Maribel Magpoc, Raphael Carloto, Kendall Colindon & Christiann Culangan
The swarm of the collective common man trying to cover various distances, taking with them on their journeys compressed in tiny spaces, various motivations, preferences and personalities. Within the confines of their commute they are one, heading toward a common direction as if tendrils of the local common thought and practice. They commiserate with their comrades the difficulties of their day to day, having to wake up early, having to take care of siblings, having no means to follow passions.
Dama| March
Ali Aldaba, PJ Cabanalan, Chloe Dellosa, Bam Garibay, Alee Garibay, Nina Garibay, Lui Gonzales, Tiffany Lafuente, Chad Montero, Katherine Nuñez, Aleli Ariola & Jo Tanierla
No U- Turn| April
Alex Tan, Amos Malayao, Bam Garibay, Emard Cañedo, Ryan Jara & Teofilo Alagao
The exhibit’s title is a bold declaration that places the artworks in a problematic context. No U-Turn implies that a u-turn, even if it is to a historical moment, a personal tragedy or an artistic choice, is either impossible or not worth it. Why and how this came to be, however, is something that deserves deeper reflection.
Room With a View| April
Alee Garibay
Can we make ourselves at home in a moment? In a person?
Can a moment be a place? Is space, like time, more elastic than it seems?
Alee Garibay's landscapes have, as of late, come with the contradiction of portraying interiority. In Room With a View, she uses her painting practice to make sense of the chaos and claustrophobia of modern life: depicting the views from windows of places where she lived during a particularly difficult period, while reflecting on how a place that can be so unforgiving and alienating will eventually be called "home."
Boxes| April
Erick Villarruz
In Boxes, Erick Villaruz puts the subject matter of the house front and center. Either singular or huddled together, forming a small neighborhood, a community, the houses are conventionally built, with A-frame roofs, mullioned windows, and with some having porches. One work features a picket fence, which delineates boundaries. But the openness of the space belies any need for privacy. These are houses set against the countryside, in rural landscapes, in far-flung places, far from the madding crowd.
Thinking Out Loud| May
Jojo Lofranco
In Thinking Out Loud, Lofranco explores the material weight of the painting medium in both fluid and coruscating strokes—thick, swirling, and energetic. The title proposes that the paintings to be read as the artist’s thoughts translated into pigment. If one extends the metaphor, the kind of thinking that Lofranco makes evident is abuzz with phenomena, decentered, and expansive. There is no square inch of the canvas that is left unactivated by the artist’s attention, which consequently makes the viewer a participant in the artist’s hectic maze of thought.
Nature x Morte| May
Alea
Aleah Rose Angeles, John Paul Duray, Reynard Borillo, Joen Sudlon & One
Nature encompasses death. The true question that braces the equation is the relationship between death and nature. To encompass, to embody, to be a part of. It is an undeniable, and perhaps clinical truth of a cyclical waking and slumber—the birth of life, and wilting death. But the process is not one consisting of a mere straight line from start to finish, but rather, an intricate web.
Knives| May
Lendl Arvin
The painting knife is an unassuming metal blade with a wooden handle, distinguishable from other knives by the bend between the handle and the blade itself. These tools are not meant to cut like other knives. As a tool for production it serves to mix colours on a palette, and is capable of lathering a painting surface with large amounts of paint or various other mediums. In the circumstance of painting one might consider the brush as an instrument of softness, and although it is indispensable in the rendering of sharp bold strokes it should be said that the knife carries with it a greater capacity for such, as a more stoic tool.
Kilem| May
Ariel Cancino, Ben John Albino, Boni De Guzman, Carlo Talion, Edz z Calimlim, Frenk Sison, Jerry Buccat, Jessica Lopez, Kel Cruz, Kevin Vila, Kinoo Padlan, Mariam Tumulto, Mel Casipit, Patrick Fernandez, Peeme Legaspi, Pope Dalisay, Rachel Anne Lacaba, and Sariel Armando Ancheta
Kilem (a Pangasinan word for “ngilo”) highlights both external and internal stimuli that have resulted in artists taking their brush or sculpting material as a direct response to them. While they work with different media and visual styles, their common concern is to see art as an instrument of transformation, both radical and subtle, in oneself and in society. Perhaps, they subscribe to the axiom long connected to journalism: “Comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.”
Alipato| June
Chrisanto Aquino, Benjie Bisaya, Lander Capiz, Judeo Herrera, Jayme Lucas, Ace Navarro, Abe Orobia, Gyang Pascual, Romer Pavilando, Patsing Ramento, Madyleine Renee, Gao Rezaga, Crisha Sagun, Kadi Santos, Harlem Sunga, Jan Tabamo, Roniel Vitamor, David Wubneg & Jared Yokte
Alipato refers to that initiating ember in producingburning coal. Marked by a few sparking pieces, shoveled together, they are on the verge of heating up matters with their own becoming. With ample wind Alipato can even raze up to serious fervor gearing up to proper intensity. Alipato explores the integration of artists imagining in a similar context, applying different approaches and creative energies on canvas. Visually these are still in their experimental, attempting rich and never-been-tried allegories yet materiality seems almost incidental be it acrylic on canvas, oil on wood or new molave wood for sculpture
Deception of the Ideals| June
Isko Anndrade, Don Bryann Bunag, Mel Cabriana, Lawrence Cervantes, Mark Maac & Marvin Quizon
JanxJanxJan| June
Georjanno Abenoja
A pre-pubescent Abenoja, studying at the time in a former all-boys high school in Tarlac not-a-town-not-yet-a-city, inspired by crude street graff would make his own invented texts and esoteric handwriting styles much to the discomfort of classmates and relatives who had to voice out said discomfort into unsolicited warnings of the impending damnation of Abenoja’s soul. His illustrations of hybrid abnormalities often immediately dismissed and condemned as debil-debil within the context of misguided religiosity.
Stand Still| June
Mark Andy Garcia
In the solo exhibition of Mark Andy Garcia, Stand Still, the landscape is paramount, without human intervention and interruption, pure in their gorgeous, vital flow. The characteristic energy of his technique--expressed through rapid, coruscating strokes—is still here, so much so that what we perceive is not merely dramatic space but the subjectivity of the artist, his way of seeing.
Suburban| July
Julius Redillas
In Suburban, the isolation of these images, resulting in its contrast with the background, allows meaning to flourish: the subjects bore no gender, no social class, and no clue of what the portraits are about. Such draws parallel with how Grant Wood’s take on suburbia in “American Gothic” has earned the curiosity of the public for decades ---we know what’s in it, but we still cannot tell what exactly it is about.
The subtlety that dictates the presence of these works, like those of Owens and Wood, directs us more to a larger and more careful evaluation of these portraits in the suburban setting: a task that catches us in our complacency of the familiar while we are trussed in the discomfort of the unknown.
Metropolis Now| July
Don Dalmacio, AJ Dimarucot, Beejay Esber, Doktor Karayom, Meneer Marcelo & Jason Moss
This show, Metropolis Now, a show about a specific space and time, is an attempt to push a select roster of artists’ individuality in their respective efforts to mirror back the metropolis’ imprint on their psyche. In essence, it would seem to promote artistic individualism within a collective space such as the metropolis, a mini-nation in itself, although finally the show should also create a seam between these individualities to produce a commonality. (One commonality already visible at the outset is the constancy of greys in the participating artists’ entries.)
Tender Trap| August
Lawrence Borsoto, Mark Magistrado, Oliver Ramos, Ivan Roxas, Cj Tañedo & Ramel Villas
Tender Trap brings together the talents of six remarkable Filipino artists upholding realistic painting traditions. Lawrence Borsoto, Mark Magistrado, Oliver Ramos, Ivan Roxas, CJ Tañedo and Ramel Villas join forces in exhibiting their recent works that harken to idealizations in imagery and portrayal. For these artists, lively yet soft brushstrokes make up the similar techniques found in their paintings, while respect for traditional scumbles and glazing effects simulate warm light that seem to emanate from their figures.
Puno.Puno| September
PJ Cabanalan & Noel Elicana
In this two-man show, Puno-Puno, by Noel Elicana and Paul John Cabanalan, back-to-back winners of Metrobank Art and Design Excellence for the Oil/Acrylic on Canvas category in 2018 and 2017, the two artists merge their visions to create a powerful testimony of origin, family, home, place, self, which intersect to map out their respective journeys both as artists and individuals. While their stylistic preoccupations are different (Elicano, for instance, references the rich coloration of earth while, Cabanalan, on the other hand, prefers the celestial blues of the sky), both artists employ rich symbolism in their works as markers of autobiography and their moment in history.
Planes of Existence| October
Bjorn Calleja, Valerie Chua, Ernest Concepcion, Donn Dalmacio, Pakz Gonzaga, Jason Montinola, Nix Puno, Rega Rahman, Art Sanchez, Kaloy Sanchez, RA Tijing, Ciane Xavier
Planes of Existence presents 12 varied perspectives from 12 different contemporary painters. Throughout the course of time, the parameters of landscape as a genre rebelled its predecessors according to what is deemed currently relevant and disposable. The inception of the genre was brought about as an essential component in uplifting the environment of the gods and figures of power up to the point of its separation: man’s decision to paint landscape as a stand-alone imagery. As history approached the twentieth century and as movements changed and questioned its predecessors, land became a malleable subject, giving more power to the ordinary man to paint as how he feels and sees it, without being constrained by structure or virtue.
Pieter| November
Ferdinand Treasure Riotoc
It is indeed a sign of greatness for a singular painting to inspire multiple incarnations. Pieter Bruegel’s Nederlandse Spreekwoorden (Netherlandish Proverbs), in its large scale depicts about a hundred and twelve recognizable proverbs and idioms, and Pieter, Ferdinand Riotoc’s recent works, bear contemporary form.
Riotoc’s layers of acrylic sheets with dripped and swirled paint may be a world apart from the pastoral genre oil-on-panel masterpiece, but the artist maximizes his medium’s character by creating vigorous pieces that may be likened to a micro lens framing Pieter’s work, or, because of the timelessness and universality of these adages, implore his audiences to ponder at these aspects of life more closely.
Santuwaryo| August
Edrick Daniel
What exactly is a sanctuary? How does one find a certain place or space and declare it as a region of refuge, of safety? In his fifth solo show, artist Edrick Daniel tries to understand a human’s need for a retreat --- what makes one believe that there is contentment in isolation. Santuwaryo creates a sense of wonder that is passed on to the viewer through Daniel’s evocative use of images: creatures that are neither human nor mythological are set against a dismal background, thus, creating a parallel world ---perhaps a haven or otherwise.
Living Death| September
Dondon Jeresano & Rando
Every act of creation necessitates an act of destruction, and this is what the viewer confronts in Living Death, the two-man show of Dondon Jeresano and Rando. In grappling with the concept, the two artists foreground death not as a cessation of life but a dark hovering presence, dismantling the structures of old tradition and setting fire to cherished things—an apocalyptic aftermath that lingers and shows no signs of abating.
Living Death| September
Dondon Jeresano & Rando
Tender Trap brings together the talents of six remarkable Filipino artists upholding realistic painting traditions. Lawrence Borsoto, Mark Magistrado, Oliver Ramos, Ivan Roxas, CJ Tañedo and Ramel Villas join forces in exhibiting their recent works that harken to idealizations in imagery and portrayal. For these artists, lively yet soft brushstrokes make up the similar techniques found in their paintings, while respect for traditional scumbles and glazing effects simulate warm light that seem to emanate from their figures.
Plain| October
Brave Singh, Jay Hidalgo & Pablo Zingapan
PLAIN just shows that the ordinary cannot be taken for granted. Hidalgo, Singh, and Zingapan articulate the need for introspection and self-awareness, but at the same time, the importance of rootedness in today’s fast paced world. PLAIN is one of a growing number of exhibits presented in Manila by the informal Ilocano Collective, a group of Ilocano contemporary artists based in Ilocos, who banded together and loosely exhibit together locally as an offshoot of Grupo Biag, a bigger group assembled by patron and museum founder Dr. Joven Cuanang. As an exhibit, it shows the curatorial rigor that the Ilocano Collective demands of its members, as much as to the sophisticated aesthetic they have evolved from within the context of artmaking in their province.
And They Lived Happily Ever After| December
Arnica Acantillado
Happily Ever After, just like Acantilado’s earlier exhibitions, is rooted in the themes of family, the inner life of children, and individual character. As a mother herself, the children depicted in the works are the indirect portraits of her own children, assigning to them qualities that she hopes they will imbibe one day. The paintings—meticulously and lovingly rendered—may be seen then as a mother’s wish for protection and guidance for her children and that they may find their way and bearing in the world despite the looming threats around them, just like in the fairytales.
Teritoryo| July
Max Balatbat
In this suite of works, Balatbat makes visible the lines and marks that delineate one space from another, the area where one has and doesn’t have power. In his unique collage technique that relies exclusively in pigment (giving birth to his paint-on-paint method), the artist demonstrates a kind of space-making, in which territories are not a given but must be marked, claimed, asserted, and, as represented by the triangle suggestive of roofs among other architectural elements, built permanent structures on.
Para sa Bayan| July
Julio Samson
In his fourth solo exhibition, Julius Samson posits a question relevant to every Filipino. PARA SA BAYAN? examines one’s responsibilities in taking action that may or may not reach national proportions, probing intention and the stimuli that motivate forces, both good and evil.
For the artist, it is a question of duty, doing one’s part to help improve the country’s economic standing, social progress, environment preservation, justice, education, and the employment and wealth of its citizens, and that is just for starters. His works express pinprick fragments of hope while portraying politicians’ broad abuse of power and selfish deeds, his paintings aiming not to proselytize but to find answers and perhaps make sense of the issues encountered every day in tri- and social media.
Awawey| August
Boni De Guzman & Jojit Solano
In the Pangasinan language, Awawey means condition. For two of the most active young Pangasinense artists in contemporary Filipino art, their artworks interpret the context they find today’s humanity in, the state of affairs.
Denizens| August
Elmer Borlongan
“Denizens,” Elmer Borlongan — true to form — has rendered the bittersweet ballads of “single figures set in an interior of a building and streets including objects related to the person’s line of work.” The overarching theme of the entire exhibition is alienation and loneliness in a foreign land, the saddest of symphonies.
Overdose| September
Caloy Gernale, Mervin Pimentel & Christopher Zamora
Caloy Gernale, Mervin Pimentel and Christopher Zamora join together to continue their thematic penchant of fleshing out the woes of Filipinos in this 3-man exhibition. The three artists take a hit on the pervading illness afflicting the nation narcotized with fanaticism and fascism. Overdose dissects the sores that make Juan and Maria suffer and examines how the bitter pill swallowed by the populace during the 2016 election complicated their condition.
Manufactured Consent| October
Jett Osian
In this solo exhibition, Manufactured Consent, Jett Osian continues his foray into how technology has seeped into our everyday life, rewiring our brain chemistry, turning us into virtual zombies who willingly submit our consent to forces that attempt to regulate our reality, history, and destiny. The stand-in for this technology is the television, which for the artist is a form of mind control, but it could be any screen that is generative of moving image: from tablets to cellphones to apparatuses of virtual reality. This is the “black mirror” underscored by the dystopian Netflix series.
Pamilya| November
Ryan Jara
In Pamilya, Jara’s solo exhibition, the artist chose to celebrate the family members (that also extend to friends) to whom he has offered to sacrifice part of his life. The show, itself, is a family portrait, featuring Jara’s parents, siblings, wife and child, and the tight knit of friends who saw him during this dark period of his life. As an acknowledgment of his own past predicament, the show highlights the self-portrait, “Downtime,” that chronicles the emotional and psychological toll that Jara went through for not being able to practice his craft.
Memoirs| September
Orley Ypon
In his fifth solo exhibition, Memoirs, Orley Ypon creates a visual autobiography of the places he has visited—from the mountainous terrain of Isabela to the frenetic urbanscape of New York City—resulting in a suite of works that are reflective of both the artist’s personal and creative journey. In his paintings, the artist is everywhere present: in the lush selection of palette, in the high degree of realism, in the impasto that visibly reveals the hand of the artist.
Mission and Vision| October
Roy Rosatase
In this solo exhibition, Mission Vision, Roy Rosatase confronts the tyranny of the everyday, the various activities we cram our schedules with as we navigate the urban fabric. This urban fabric is familiar to those who have called the Philippines home—from pawnshops to fast food chains to the parts of the city that are constantly being torn down and rebuilt. In this suite of meticulously rendered photorealistic paintings, daylight appears harsh and unrelenting, throwing long, indelible shadows on streets and pavements.
Somewhere Else| November
Don Bryan Bunag
Somewhere Else situates us near the shore of the wide open sea, with the sky taking up the upper half of the picture plane. Using diaphanous swirls and shading, he conjures a secondary picture plane over the main image. The secondary picture, hazy and incomplete, is of a multitude of peoples seemingly preoccupied with their own daily lives, or is it just our projection?
Pursuit of Happiness| December
Year- End Show
Have artists forgotten to be happy
Perhaps Pursuit of Happiness are giving us a whole different paradigm of what happiness means to the people today. Hopefully we are done with the notions of prosperity as indulgent excess, and happiness is social justice, equal access, austere as it may be during these times, but nonetheless hoping for an humanist, compassionate distribution of wealth. Perhaps it is about the fruits of merits, and the hope that they mean something, instead of privilege that has been inherited, or taken forcibly. Or can it be that we are now made of less saccharine stuff? So therefore our happiness is sober but true; quiet but substantial; simple yet nourishing; accomplished yet communal?