About the Event
Artery Art Space proudly presents “Anyplace Whatever“ featuring works by Catalina Africa, Richard Quebral, and Mai Saporsantos, charting the places, the events, the things, and the myriad qualities, that the mind dreams and experiences of about the surrounding life in order to reinvent and narrate a portrait of distance and location, time and the present, the vicissitudes of the everyday, global concerns and micro-politics, news and current events in relation to the personal, plastic characterization and whimsy, collage realities and non-linear thought, documentation and facts as alchemical ingredients to storytelling, and medium specific practice and the limitation of language in explaining the essence of it all.
This exhibit aims toward world building done in imaginative terms, allowing an aesthetic that is imbued with pop and surrealism, abstraction and appropriation that use painting and various media in presenting another way of looking and living.
Catalina Africa’s compositions are visual narratives of life, symbolized by the expanse and depth of the sea, the roam and textures of the land that turn into labyrinths of joy and wonder, and the everyday things that provide mythmaking and dream, all combined into a process of pure existence and being. Africa uses a variety of media, from found materials to painting, sculpture and video, in establishing her narratives about personal discovery and the joy of living, combining representational elements with abstract design. She is a graduate of the University of the Philippines College of Fine Art in Diliman, and studied at Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine, U.S. Africa has previously shown at Artery Art Space and at Finale Art File.
Mai Saporsantos makes paintings that are inspired by language and the fascination and confusion it brings especially when applied to the visual vocabulary of this discipline, where signifiers float and signification can be tied to anything else, bringing a daring and unique assemblage of found imagery, dream sequences, personal anecdotes, observed reality and the interpretation of its objects, into a vibrant system of symbols, pattern, and abstraction. Saporsantos studied at the Art Students League in New York, and has a BA in Art Studies from the University of the Philippines. She has exhibited at Artery Art Space, Vinyl on Vinyl Gallery, and at Mono8 Gallery.
The psychology of the everyday in full swatches of mood flowing through the conundrum of the domestic routine, depicting laughter and the forking paths of pleasure and comfort that bring dramatic tension and adventurous poise altogether presented in Richard Quebral’s mixed media works, bespeak of the modern malaise of alienation, boredom, and material consumption that calls for transformation and change. Quebral has previous exhibitions at Metro Gallery and at Blanc Gallery.