Art Fair Philippines 2024: Here’s Everything We Know So Far

Art Fair Philippines is set to return this year, and we have all the details on the leading venue for exhibiting and selling modern and contemporary Filipino art.

The 2024 edition of Art Fair Philippines will be held from February 16 to 18, 2024. It will turn The Link, a car park in Makati City, into a multi-level exhibition hub for modern and contemporary Filipino art.

Guests can look, appreciate, and purchase art from the country’s top galleries, including those from Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Spain, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam, as well as more exhibitors from the Metaverse.

This year will present an expanded program that spotlights the Philippine visual arts, considered one of Southeast Asia’s most vibrant creative landscapes.

Here’s what else you can expect:

ArtFairPH/Projects and special exhibitions

ArtFairPH/Projects and special exhibitions are a yearly highlight, showcasing a collection of thoughtful and innovative exhibitions commissioned for the fair.

This year will feature works by renowned Filipino artists including Jonathan Ching, Jigger Cruz, Gean Brix Garcia, Rod Paras-Perez; a selection of women modernists; and a group of muralist painters mentored by Alfredo Esquillo Jr. and Renato Habulan. Their pieces will be installed in a space conceptualized by production designer and theater director Ed Lacson.

The Projects section also features Brooklyn-based multi-disciplinary artist Mr. StarCity; Romanian conceptual artist Andreea Medar; and a special performance piece by Spanish artist Eugenio Ampudia, presented in partnership with the Embassy of Spain in Manila.

Pambabae, meanwhile, aims to reappraise and highlight the contribution of Filipina modernists who have largely been overshadowed by their male contemporaries. The exhibition will span the years 1969 to 1989, two decades that saw an explosion of creativity which was significant in the development of Philippine modern art.

The women artists in this exhibition include Ivi Avellana Cosio, Ileana Lee, Nelfa Querubin, Evelyn Collantes, Phyllis Zaballero, and Lilian Hwang.

Art Fair Philippines 2024 also celebrates the 10th anniversary and winding down of the Karen H. Montinola (KHM) Selection, a grant given by the Montinola family in memory of a collector who championed the works of emerging Filipino artists. The 2024 KHM Selection grant has been awarded to visual artist Gean Brix Garcia.

To commemorate the special milestone of the grant, Art Fair Philippines 2024 will have a retrospective exhibit curated by art consultant Norman Crisologo, featuring recipients of the grant begun in 2014, namely: Pio Abad (2014), Mike Adrao (2015), Mac Valdezco (2016), Mark Valenzuela (2017), Alvin Zafra (2018), Liv Vinluan (2019), Carlo Villafuerte (2021), Melvin Guirhem (2022), and Faye Abantao (2023).

ArtFairPH/Residencies

Artists are given opportunities to deepen their practice and develop networks beyond their usual context, such as working in their studios. The time spent in another place enables them to work on a new project or idea and collaborate with artists from the community they are immersed in. It was with these in mind that the Art Fair Philippines residency program was conceived in collaboration with five partners around the country.

The selected residency artists are Mark Salvatus for Manila Observatory in Quezon City, Manila; Anna Miguel Cervantes for Linangan Art Residency in Alfonso, Cavite; Jett Ilagan for Emerging Islands in San Juan, La Union; Julian Tapales for Butanding Barrio in Puerto Princesa, Palawan; and Renz Baluyot for Orange Projects in Bacolod, Negros Occidental. They are joined by two international artists who have joined the residency program in Orange Project this 2024 – Iseult Perrault and Petr Hajdyla.

Learning at #ArtFairPH

For the 2024 edition, Art Fair Philippines continues its partnership with the Ateneo Art Gallery to present a series of talks that aims to provide insight into an artist’s work and life, art forms, artistic processes, collectors, and interests.

This year’s Art Fair PH/Talks, includes discussions on the intersections of art and science, photography as authorship, women in modern art, and reading images from a historical perspective, among others.

There will also be a demonstration on basic stretching, matting, and framing of canvas, and a discussion on the basics of artwork conservation, with the special participation from the Lopez Museum.

ArtFairPH/Digital, Photo, and Film

ArtFairPH/Digital focuses on digital media and work that incorporates and engages with computer technology, animation, augmented reality, artificial intelligence, and the metaverse.

For 2024, Art Fair Philippines flies in David Gryn, founder of Daata, the foremost proponent of digital art globally. Gryn presents Best Dressed Chicken (Manila Version), a selection of great digital video artworks that engage with notions of vanity and choice.

This playlist focuses on MIlo Creese, with his AI work A Complicated Dance, George Roxby Smith’s series Just Breathe, and the video works of Jane Bustin, who will be present at the fair.

Another highlight of the Digital section is a special exhibit in collaboration with CryptoArt PH, a vibrant community dedicated to empowering Filipino creators in the dynamic web3 space. This will showcase the incredible talent and innovation of Filipino artists in the realm of NFTs and blockchain technology.

Photography

The ArtFairPH/Photo section will shine  a spotlight on photography as part of the contemporary art landscape in the country.

This year, its sole exhibitor is FotomotoPH, a Manila-based organization of visionary photographers curators and writers dedicated to promoting Philippine photography through an annual cycle of exhibitions, public programs, and special projects with art spaces throughout the archipelago. The exhibition will be curated by Sandra Palomar, former director of the Metropolitan Museum of Manila.

Film

ArtFairPH/Film presents NO SHOWING, a project curated by filmmaker Moira Lang.

This is a hangout/speakeasy/watering hole/listening party/dance floor/breathing space for filmmakers and filmgoers to weigh, diagnose, and compare notes and remedies on the state of movie making and moviegoing in the Philippines. It is an event as well as a concept, a festival–not of screenings, but of conversations–over beer, with music by selected filmmakers playing just loud enough to talk and to listen to one another.

10 Days of Art, Public Art, and the Gallery Weekend

Also complementing the fair is the 10 Days of Art initiative highlighting a series of events around the Makati Central Business District with participation by galleries, museums, and other establishments. The much anticipated public art component of 10 Days of Art will feature in two locations.

Visible along Ayala Avenue, at the Tower One Fountain area, trans-disciplinary visual artist Derek Tumala presents A Warm Orange-Colored Liquid, his biggest and most ambitious work to date.

Motion graphics artist and multimedia engineer Isaiah Cacnio collaborated with digital artists AJ Dimarucot and Carlos for an exciting video projection, Prismatic Embrace. This will be seen on the Green Wall of Ayala Triangle Garden Tower 2.

To kick off 10 Days of Art, Art Fair Philippines presents the Gallery Weekend from February 9 to 11, 2024, where visitors are encouraged to see the gallery exhibitions at their respective locations throughout this three-day effort. For schedule and updates, visit 10daysofart.com.

Visit Art Fair Philippines 2024

Fair tickets can be purchased in advance at www.artfairphilippines.com. Tickets will also be available at the reception area of Art Fair Philippines from February 16 to 18, 2024.

For more information, please visit the Art Fair Philippines website and follow Art Fair Philippines on Instagram (@artfairph) and Facebook (facebook.com/artfairph).

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