This is going to be the first of many (probably) posts on ManilArt 2011. For those who don’t yet know, ManilArt is an art festival in the Philippines. It’s on its third year now, and it features about half the number of participants last year. Personally, I think that it’s a good idea to pare down the numbers. Last year’s was just too overwhelming. I was there for the entire duration, so I got to spend time with all of the art and really just look at what was up for display. Some people only get a day to look around, so it’s nice that they can this time around.

Here are some photos from opening night. I’m hoping to get better photos of the pieces I loved today and tomorrow. You can click on the photos if you want to find out who the artists are and for what gallery they were made.

Please stop by the NBC Tent if you have the time! I have a few works up, if anyone’s interested in seeing them. My brother has a painting up, too. It’s gorgeous, for the record. Lots of great art up by other artists as well.

ManilArt 2011 will run until tomorrow (Saturday), the 27th. The festival is open from 11am to 8pm. Tickets are at Php 200 each but if you’re there, and I happen to be there as well, send me a text message and I might be able to get you in.

Hope to see y’all! Thanks to everyone who dropped by already. Much appreciated by the n00b. :)

(by Nilo Ilarde.)

Roberto Chabet is one of my favorite Filipino artists. I grew up around his work, with his name ringing and clanging along so very clearly in my head. Sometimes, I forget that not everyone was brought up in the same environment as I was, so I forget that not everyone is really acquainted with artists that came after the Amorsolos of the Philippines.

2011 marks the fiftieth year of Chabet’s career as an artist, so many galleries decided to mount shows in his honor. It’s a little more than halfway through the year, and so far, I’ve seen so many wonderful exhibits that celebrate Chabet’s contribution and talent, but one of my favorites is the latest one held by Manila Contemporary. It’s a group show entitled I Miss the 20th Century.

While a lot of the pieces are strong in themselves, I think that the strength of this group show also lies on the brilliance of its curation. A lot of people throw that word around these days, but I think that, to call yourself a curator, you must know and understand how works of art communicate with the space they inhabit. It doesn’t merely concern the selection of pieces, which I think is how it is being used right now.

Chabet has been (informally?) introduced as the father of conceptual art in the Philippines. I think it’s because he really tests ideas and pushes boundaries with his work. I think that the body of work presented in this show is truly strong in this respect. It is such an odd but delightful mix of ideas and experiments by people who had been inspired by the man.

This piece by Felix Bacolor, for example, is currently an unassuming black pool. The intention of the piece is to create an environment for mold to randomly grow, recreating constellations.

Yolanda Perez-Johnson’s “Pick and Throw Up” is an interactive piece, where one is invited to pick up sticks—possibly a throw-back to the children’s game—and throw it up into the netting, turning it into an almost collaborative effort between the artist and the viewer. Gerardo Tan’s “Self-Portrait” is a projected loop of his angiogram.

Lara de los Reyes’ piece is one of the most interactive ones, where everyone is invited to “set free” the balloon heads that resemble Mr. Chabet. The balloon bodies are filled with air, while the heads are filled with helium, and cutting the string causes the heads to flow up towards the ceiling.

Juan Alcazaren’s “The Guillotine Perspective” is one of my favorite pieces. It is so beautiful, and intriguing. I just love how you can look at it and keep on finding new things to be fascinated by.

(Roberto Chabet, left)

(Yolanda Perez-Johnson, above. Bernardo Pacquing, detail.)

(Soler.)

I’m so excited to see the last remaining shows. I wish I could have gone to all of them, but I’m really glad I went to this one. Try to catch it if you can. I think you’ll know what I mean about space and objects (and their relationship with one another) when you immerse yourself in the space.

I Miss the 20th Century will run from August 20-September 11, 2011.

Manila Contemporary
Tuesday – Saturday: 11am – 7pm
Sunday: 11am – 4pm
Closed on Mondays and public holidays

Whitespace 2314, Chino Roces Avenue
Pasong Tamo Extension, Makati City, Philippines
+63 2 8447328

Or, there are way too many awesome shows going on in the Philippines right now, and I can’t possibly go to all of them, but here is a post in which I try to go to as many as I can in a night.

(I am itching to update about the weekend, only because it was super awesome—until the very, very end, and then it kind of went to the nearest, shit-sparsiest part of Shitville. But that is another tale for another day.)

I don’t go to a lot of shows (at least, not as much as I’d like to), but apparently I go to them more than the average person. The usual reason is that people don’t really know when shows open. My family goes to them a lot, and I kind of joke about how these excursions are actually family field trips, because I have a lame sense of humor. But anyway. On the 27th of April, I went to properly see 3 shows, all of which were, on most levels, inspiring.

Geraldine Javier

Painters as Photographers is a group show featuring photographs taken by artists who usually work on paintings, rather than photographs. It was curated by Racehl Rillo, and featured the works of Geraldine Javier, Patty Eustaquio, Yasmin Sison, and Nona Garcia. It was interesting to see how they worked with a medium that they didn’t really use in most of their works. I felt like the whole show wasn’t very cohesive, like they weren’t telling the same story. I love that they moved away from their typical mediums and did work that they weren’t particularly known for, though.

Lara delos Reyes

An Impossible Farewell is the first show of Lara delos Reyes’ that I’ve seen, so I’m not familiar with her work, but I am impressed and moved. I love it when artists use unexpected mediums, and in this case, she rendered many images and text using embroidery done with hair. It’s interesting to see also the contrast of dark imagery with the delicateness of what she used as her base (which look to be vintage embroidered handkerchiefs, correct me if I’m wrong). I get really excited when people play around with new ideas, so this was especially refreshing to me.

Lara delos Reyes (detail)

I’m not sure until when these shows will be on view, but you can drop by Silverlens and SLab at 2320 Pasong Tamo Ext. Warehouse 2, Yupangco Building, between 10am and 7pm (M-F) or 1pm and 6pm (Sat). You can give them a call if you want to make sure they’re open when you plan to go: (632) 816-0044.

Anna Hellsgård and Christian Gfeller from Bongoût, Berlin.

RE:SURGO! is a two-man show by Berlin-based artists Anna Hellsgård and Christian Gfeller. They run Bongoût, which is “an independent artist-run space.” Re:Surgo! is “a silkscreen & design studio, an art publishing company, and a retail store devoted to the diffusion and promotion of innovative creation.”

Re:Surgo! is the inaugural show of the newly-opened DAGC Gallery. The show featured large format prints that are unique (meaning, they’re producing only one of each). I have a couple of favorites, but no money to burn, so I’m just going to stand in the distance and admire them. What I love about them is that they produce a lot of unique books using traditional screenprinting techniques, some of which are on display. They seem to believe in the power (and magic!) of collaborative work between artists, because as much as they create art together, they also have a lot of pieces and collaborations with other artists from all over the world.

Over the last weekend, they also held a three-day workshop for people interested in silkscreen printing, and it was a lot of fun. I’ll be posting about that when I get the time (which I hope is soon). In the meantime, bask in the greatness of these works.

RE:SURGO! is going to be on view until the 4th of June at the Department of Avant-Garde Clichés Gallery, located at 2289 Pasong Tamo Extension, UPRC III Building, Makati City. You can give them a call at (632) 817-2042 for gallery hours.

P.S. Organic beer!

This way to more photos. Continue reading A little bit of artistry….

Months ago, I joined Art House Co-Op‘s The Sketchbook Project. They give you about three months to fill up a sketchbook according to a theme, then you send it back to them, and they tour it around a few cities so that people can look at it and borrow it (like a library).

I was very excited to do this (the theme I chose was Things That Changed Other Things), but true to form, I put off doing it at the last minute. The journals needed to be sent and postmarked by January 15 (which fell on a Saturday!) so my deadline was the 14th. By the 13th, I had three pages done. I was ready to give up and sleep, but I remembered my post and decided to get as far as I could with it. In a span of about ten straight hours of making collages and trying not to die, I managed to fill up a Moleskine!

Not too so adherent to the theme; at least, not in an obvious way. I’m excited to do this again, although I think I’m going to try out their other project, a new one called The Fiction Project, which seems a lot more up my alley anyway.

In the meantime, there’s this, and while it’s not the best I could have done (I was really operating on a sort of zombie, auto-pilot mode), especially considering the amount of time I had, I’m glad I didn’t give up on it. At least I won’t feel like a liar whenever I wear this shirt out:

More photos are under the cut, but you can view the entire thing over here. The ones I’ve posted up are a few of my favorites, though. My sketchbook’s on its way to New York now. I hope it finds its way to one of you. :)

Continue reading The Sketchbook Project, 2011….

I absolutely love looking at studios and workspaces. I don’t know if it’s because I am just plain nosy, or if this inclination towards seeing the spaces where a person makes things happen has a deeper, more meaningful motivation behind it. I just really, love looking at people’s spaces. I feel like it says a lot about who they are and how they work. Here are some of my favorite workspace-related blogs, in case you were curious:

• Workspaces, Tumblr
• Anik-Anik Love (Filipino creatives)
• Workspaces, Share Some Candy

The point of this post: My brother and I tagged along with my parents, who were having a meeting with Manuel Ocampo. You must understand that I am pretty much in awe of this man. Aside from being an art world BAMF with his name in lights all over the world, he was also partly responsible for the art inside Beck’s Odelay. Degrees of separation down to three! (Two? How do you count them?) Despite that, he is also quite nice and sincere. I wrote about him and his curatorial debut, a group exhibit comprised of Filipino artists held in Berlin, in UNO Magazine, for their October issue. (Solenn Heussaff was on the cover, my heart!)

(I do that with my shirt whenever I feel awkward/displaced. Good of my dad to capture it on film?)

Anyway, what was supposed to be a meeting turned out to be a studio visit to two other artists’ spaces—Gerry Tan’s and David Grigg’s—and a gallery, all of which were conveniently located not three minutes away from each other. Here are a few photos, the rest will be under the cut.

Seeing these workspaces reminded me of the reason behind the name of this little home for me, my sacred space. Taking the name from Jonathan Safran Foer’s “Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close,” my favorite book, where he talks about “Nothing Places.” To quote:

“[W]e started marking off areas in the apartment as “Nothing Places,” in which one could be assured of complete privacy, we agreed that we never would look at the marked-off zones, that they would be nonexistent territories in the apartment in which one could temporarily cease to exist…”

The idea of my own little area, to be who I am and make what I like, regardless of other factors, is so appealing to me. I think that’s maybe why I always talk about wanting to move out. It’s not that I’m tired of the people I live with (because, at the very end of it, I do love my family very much), or that my circumstances are at all inconvenient. I just really think that I maybe need a space—mine—to be me, without having to explain or apologize or hold back. I think I just really need to mark off my own Nothing Spaces, beyond the screen.

Perhaps in 2011? For now, I’ll make do with what I have, try to be the most of myself that I can be.

Loads more photos under the cut. They’re pretty interesting. :)

Continue reading Studio Visits & Nothing Places….

Photos from the huge-ass group show that opened on Wednesday. I had four works up, but I don’t have pictures of them at the moment. There are new works coming in mid-run, too, so I will do a proper update then. It was a really great night. Some friends dropped by & it was really fun. I don’t usually invite people because I feel like I am making them go to things they do not want to (heh), but I’m really glad people I actually knew went. So, thanks. :)

Run is until the 31st of December.

West Gallery is located at 48 West Avenue, Quezon City.
Gallery hours are 10am-6pm, Monday-Saturday.

Continue reading 12×9: A Small Update….