Gallery greets the new year by featuring the works of 14 Chinese-Filipino artists.
Art Lounge Manila marks the year of the Water Rabbit with “Auspicious Beginnings 8+8.” Ongoing until January 31 at the Podium Ortigas, the gallery’s opening salvo features Chinese-Filipino artist Addie Cukingnan, Meneline Wong, Charlie Co, Ronnie Lim, Dexter Sy, Rudy Yu, Ed Uygongco, Seb Chua, Elena Coyiu, Tracie Anglo Dizon, Jo Uygongco, Victor Ng, Kylo Yu, Winna Go and Margarita Lim.
A community is often defined as a group of people living in the same place or having similar particular characteristics, which set them apart, such as a common language, culture, physical traits or values. Our country boasts of hundreds of communities based on language groups, for example, which do not necessarily coincide with geographically and politically delineated territories of province or region.
One such community is composed of Chinese-Filipinos. Calling various parts of the archipelago their home, this group has contributed so much to our Pinoy culture that we often fail to see how ingrained many of their contributions are. Yet despite more than half a millennium of constant integration and reintegration, and direct and indirect participation of Chinese-Filipinos in our economic, political and cultural patrimony, the “Chinoy” community has managed to retain many cultural traits that set them apart from other cultural communities in the country.
The Chinese Lunar New Year is one such event, which highlights how different the community is from the rest. Celebrating the start of a new year based on the moon’s cycle, as opposed to the sun’s, shows a difference in orientation as well as in certain traditions. These differences are reinterpreted and redefined on the canvases of the 14 participating artists.
For more information, visit the Art Lounge Manila website, www.artloungemanila.com. Or check their social media pages, FB: @artloungemanila; IG: @artloungemanila, for more details.
