Manila’s art map: 9 art exhibitions to catch this October
October is shaping up to be a bustling month for Manila’s lineup of art exhibitions. Across Makati, BGC, and Quezon City, galleries are opening shows that stretch from the childlike and personal to the digitally experimental.
Whether you’re drawn to abstract textures, whimsical plays on sculpture, or meditations on medium, this month’s lineup maps an overview of contemporary art practices in the Philippines in dialogue with the pressing issues of the world—some subtly, some less so. Here’s a glimpse of some of the dozens of shows that are set to open their doors this October.
1. “Archipelago” by Enrico Minguzzi at Altro Mondo Arte Contemporanea
For “Archipelago,” Italian artist Enrico Minguzzi places 107 Petri dishes on the floor in the shape of the Philippine islands. Rather than specimens, they hold pigments set in epoxy resin, tiny pools of color that, as the exhibition notes put it, “resemble both a map of the nation and a primordial soup,” inviting reflection on “the fragmentary nature of identity: cultural, geographic, and personal.”
Encircling this conceptual, cartographic constellation are Minguzzi’s ethereal paintings and ceramics.
Oct. 11 to Nov. 22, Altro Mondo Creative Space, 1159 Chino Roces Ave., Makati City
2. “Scratch to an Itch” curated by Raul Rodriguez at Galleria Duemila
Curated by Raul Rodriguez, “Scratch to an Itch” takes its title from a phrase RM de Leon once used to capture a painting’s irresistible pull, one which serves as a reminder, as the show notes by JTO write, of “the painter’s intrinsic compulsion to paint: the raison d’être of the artistic life.”
The show gathers a wide range of painting-centric works from Al Cruz, Alvin Villaruel, Argie Bandoy, Dan Raralio, Don Djerassi Dalmacio, Erik Sausa, Joe Bautista, Jonathan Olazo, Jose Naval, Raul Rodriguez, Ronald Achacoso, and RM de Leon.
The artists trace painting’s restless history from its break with pure mimesis, through Picasso’s chair-caning collage, Minimalism’s stark objecthood, and the postmodern revivals that followed, from Sottsass’ gestures to the transavantgarde. Rather than adhering to a grand narrative, the contemporary practices splinter into localized and overlapping languages, opening space for new approaches.
Sept. 13 to Oct. 11, Galleria Duemila, 210 Loring St., Pasay City
3. “Phantom Limb” by Derek Tumala at Tarzeer Pictures
For his second solo exhibition with Tarzeer Pictures, multidisciplinary artist Derek Tumala creates a network of 11 video objects, composed of “deconstructed film of one-act tales in perfect loops,” as the exhibition notes write. Images range from doomsday fish to swarms of ants and clocks that don’t tell time as well as overlapping sunsets and sunrises.
Highly research-based, Tumala directs facts to slip into myth, with fiction hardening into its own kind of truth. He pieces together fragments in an answer to contemporary uncertainty, loss, missing truths, excessive damage and, ultimately, regeneration.
Sept. 11 to Oct. 30, Tarzeer Pictures, 2288 Chino Roces Ave., Makati City
4. “Döstädning” organized by Christina Quisumbing Ramilo at Gravity Art Space
Gravity Art Space is currently running an ambitious program of seven exhibitions, “Joinery” by Octo Cornelius, “Portrait of a Mother” by Erika Mayo, “Room That Hold No One” by Faye Abantao, “Fortress” by Daryl Feril, “Re(Petitions)” by Cha Roque, and “Laruan 2.0,” a one-day group show presented by Gravity Art Shop. Among these is “Döstädning,” organized by Christina Quisumbing Ramilo.
“Döstädning” is part of the ongoing “Death Cleaners” series, which draws from the Swedish concept of döstädning, a systematic practice of decluttering to ease the burden on loved ones after one’s passing.
The second installment gathers works by Pope Bacay, Jef Carnay, Marionne Contreras, Octo Cornelius, Johanna Helmuth, Paolo Icasas, Efren Madlangsakay, Elaine Navas, Indy Paredes, and Miguel Puyat. Each artist responds to objects from Ramilo’s sprawling archive, reinventing discarded canvases, textiles, and furniture into works that reveal new meaning that remain “restless in the in-between.”
Sept. 19 to Oct. 17, Gravity Art Space, Mo. Ignacio Ave. Diliman, Quezon City
5. “The Marshall Chronicles: Chapter 1” by Natalya Lagdameo at Aphro Living
Marshall began life as a high school doodle, as an unlikely offspring of what Natalya Lagdameo imagined as an alien father and a gumdrop mother. The sculptural companion, built in wood and fabric, has been fondly described by Lagdameo as a “dopey little guy… a little Filipino alien” who might appear at the dining table, cross-legged, or even on a yoga mat beside her: “He does whatever. He does yoga with me.”
Round-bodied, thin-limbed, and forever shifting costumes, he channels Lagdameo’s fascination with playful contradictions, her exploration of identity through form, and what she calls her inner “weird,” reminding us that art can be “lighter, stranger, and more joyful, one Marshall at a time.”
Sept. 11 to Oct. 4, Aphro Living, The Alley at Karrivin Plaza, Chino Roces Ave. Ext., Makati City
6. “Fractured Fabric” by Marina Cruz at Silverlens Manila
In “Fractured Fabric,” Marina Cruz returns to the garments first uncovered in her grandmother’s closets as a student, when a search for gauze led her instead to her mother’s baptismal dress.
Two decades on, Cruz continues to mine these heirloom clothes in a memory-rooted practice that spills into the present. In this latest exhibit, she paints the clothing not as whole objects, but through close-ups of fragments, blurring into abstraction.
As Nicole Soriano writes, “Fractured Fabric ultimately celebrates the scars of the fabrics—their holes, frays, and blotches. Cruz sees in them a kind of beauty: traces of her family’s endurance and care, with all their vulnerabilities.”
Oct. 4 to Nov. 8, Silverlens Manila, 2263 Chino Roces Ave., Makati City
7. “Audacity” curated by Chloe Magpayo at RCBC Plaza
“In a landscape where histories are layered and futures uncertain, radicality takes many shapes—reinvention, recalibration, refusal.”
“Audacity,” curated by Chloe Magpayo, gathers together a diverse group of artists who experiment instinctively and boldly, “reminding us what art can be—urgent, vital, alive.” “Their works embrace risk and possibility,” the curator comments, “opening space for new ways of seeing and feeling.”
Featuring Bianca Carague, Brisa Amir, Christina Lopez, Costantino Zicarelli, Datu Arellano, Derek Tumala, Denver Garza, Doktor Karayom, Fruitjuice Factori Studio, James Clar, Judy Freya Sibayan, Kristoffer Ardeña, Lesley-Anne Cao, Luis Antonio Santos, Mano Gonzales, Marco Santos, Maricar Tolentino, Marionne Contreras, Miguel Lorenzo Uy, Rhaz Oriente, Vien Valencia, and Zoraya Lua, the exhibition is organized by Marco Santos, Teddy Catuira, and Bianca Bauer, presenting art as a living force, shaped by audacity itself.
Oct. 15 to Nov. 15 at Podium 3 Tower II, RCBC Plaza, Buendia Ave. corner Ayala Ave., Makati City
8. “Echoes in Two Voices: A Visual Dialogue Between Mother and Son” at Kapitolyo Art Space
In this mother and son exhibition, Nanette Ana Maria Villanueva presents layered compositions alongside her 20-year-old son, Julian Raheb’s, intricate pen-and-ink drawings.
While Villanueva explores rhythm, memory, and “disciplined chaos,” her son’s work balances with a counterpoint through precise lines and musical sensibility, shaped by his own talent as a pianist and composer.
Oct. 4 to 17 at Kapitolyo Art Space, 23 West Capitol Drive, Pasig City
9. “Between the Garden and the Jungle: Reimagining Philippine Contemporary Art in the Era of Embodied Precarity” curated by Manuel Ocampo at Pablo Fort
Curated by Manuel Ocampo, this group exhibition features works by Allan Balisi, Darrel Ballesteros, Argie Bandoy, Annie Cabigting, Bjorn Calleja, Jigger Cruz, Kiko Escora, Doktor Karayom, Auggie Fontanilla, Tin Garcia, Romeo Lee, Gene Paul Martin, Pow Martinez, Elaine Navas, Arvin Nogueras, Geremy Samala, Isabel Santos, Luis Santos, Art Tavera, David Ryan Viray, and MM Yu.
The exhibition seems to frame contemporary practice in the Philippines as caught between cultivation and wilderness, intimacy and disorder, offering multiple readings of what it means to make art in these precarious times.
Sept. 27 to Nov. 15, Pablo Fort, South of Market Condominium, BGC
Manila’s art scene comes alive
With such an array of exhibitions opening side by side, October is an apt time to trace the varied paths that contemporary artists in the Philippines are taking, from revisiting family archives to conjuring mythologies out of fragments, fictions, and truths.
While these are just a few of the exhibitions running this October, they show how the city’s art scene can be both sprawling and intimate, imagining both past and future, in a city that often oscillates between a bucolic garden and a wild jungle.
