A little art fair

As an artist, I have to admit, seeing different art styles other than my own can be highly motivating and inspiring. And since the pandemic happened, I have never set foot in an art gallery, exhibit or museum and it really makes me lose sanity 😅😅😅 not on an exaggeration though but I swear, seeing the piece live and in front of me has a different appeal compared to when I see them on my phone screen or a tablet screen.

It might just be with how involved I was with exhibits, during pre-pandemic days. I don't know but, live art just really hits different. Like when you see each stroke or line up close, you really feel something. And that's when you know the artist is sincere, when their techniques and ideas reach you.

Anyways, I've actually been whining to a close friend of mine about how I want to go museum hopping again or at least, exhibit hopping because we used to do that all the time during our undergraduate years. Like those were the only times I could be myself and not the chemist or the nerd. Just the me that still gets amazed with how artists can bring life to their images.

Last year, as I recall, and in 2020, art-fair Makati still proceeded like they would on a yearly basis but those exhibits were all virtual and they focused more on the artist's workspace rather than the pieces they were trying to showcase. It was nice and I attended both virtual exhibits of those years. When they announced a physical gallery this year though, I was really excited for it! So was my gallery buddy. And I didn't even have to ask her to go with me because she already expected I'd ask her to go with me. I didn't even call her, she called me and told me that she already had tickets reserved for the last night of the exhibit (April 1).

Just for additional info. All those landmarks are the galleries covered by the ticket, which was why it was a bit pricey. We planned to see at least 3 galleries but since she kind of got there late, we only got to see 2 of them. And it was unfortunate that the gallery was only open until 8pm.

In the end, we only got to see the yavuz gallery and the eskinita art gallery. It would have been great if we got to see more but I'm happy with what we could see.

These pieces were exhibited along with the wall of screenprinted crows. And I don't know but I kind of have a fascination with these pieces in a sense that they're so morbid. And I later found out that the artist bought real teeth from a dentist and that's what he used there 😅😅😅 and it kind of creeped me out because I've heard of blood painting before but I can't imagine people using teeth now

In the next exhibit room, there was this thing called cabinet art. It was also a bit creepy and it reminded me a bit on Mexican and spanish cabinets because there are some heavily Spanish influenced family that arrange their Saint statues in a cabinet in a similar fashion. But in this case, the figures have this creepy vibe to it and these were the only few I could capture but there were 10 of these in that exhibit room and each display was more grotesque than the last 😅 and I don't think people would want to see that here

Moving on, this piece was the one that really struck me. It was called "interconnected" and it definitely was. But what I admired here was that it was completely crocheted and the fact that it was hung high enough so that you could go under to see every stitch detail. I think I spent the longest time here because it was really fascinating to me. And too bad I'm too lazy to convert videos into GIFs but I would have loved to show you guys a closer shot of this and all the details in it.

Sad I couldn't retain the original video quality for this one but this next room had very timely topics in it. All tackling a different side of people's lives but just in a different manner. Not sure what this art style is but the medium of choice is acrylic paint

I liked this piece too. And I believe the style used was fresco? I honestly forgot what it's called but here, the artist used oil paints and only shaped it with the spatula. The style is definitely cool and my favourite piece was the portrait, sadly I couldn't get a picture because of the crowd

This was also part of the gallery but I couldn't tell whether it's just a display or an art piece. That's the confusing part but I still included it because why not UwU it's still pretty and I still count it as art

This gallery was one I also liked because it was so unique. It combined quilting and painting! And from afar, you really would struggle to tell apart which is the textured fabric part and which one was just painted over. It was a really colorful room that delved mostly into fantasy pieces

There was also this artist whose pieces were highly satirical. I forgot what each piece tackled but I remembered that it generally made fun of the cock fighting past time. I also forgot what the artist was saying regarding his approach to the past time because I was more concerned with how he managed to blend that nicely with oil pastels 😅😅

This one was quite twisted too but for some reason, it's a highly timely piece too. It just depends on who you think the artist refers to

I think... These were the last pieces I took photos of in the yuvuz gallery. The eskinita gallery wasn't that far but it mostly covored photography and fashion so I couldn't really relate to it much

I was specifically drawn to these photos though because I thought they'd look good painted and because the body language was kind of alluring.

We ended up walking through the galleries until 8 and I didn't know Ayala triangle was so pretty at night so we just ordered take out burgers then we ate here to enjoy the ambiance 😅 then we went home around 9 and I'm hoping we could see more galleries open up soon

That's all from me! Let's hope I can continuously write again with the 30+ samples I still need to face tomorrow