2/F YMC BLDG 2, 2320 Pasong Tamo Extension, Makati City, Philippines
Gallery Hours are 10am to 7pm Mondays to Fridays and 1pm to 6pm on Saturdays.
(+632) 816.00.44 / (+63905) 2650873
For inquiries or to be added in our mailing list, email manage@silverlensphoto.com

Mirroring the elements, design and professional structure of the Silverlens Gallery, SLab (Silverlens Lab) is the new gallery, established 2008, for Philippine contemporary art under the Silverlens Group. Silverlens and SLab artists push the boundaries of their medium and are aggressive in their dialogue with a critical audience. The gallery artists are represented by Silverlens internationally for their exposure, recall, recognition, and collection.

Luis Lorenzana's
'The Midnight Lullaby'
by Cathy Paras-Lara

Silverlens Gallery proudly presents 'The Midnight Lullaby,' a solo exhibit at SLab's 20Square Gallery by Luis Lorenzana named after the largest exhibition piece included in the show that Lorenzana has completed in three years.

"This particular work is larger in scale, which means that I really needed the time to finish it. I turned down solo exhibit offers from galleries abroad in the process, explaining to them that I owe my beloved country this exhibit," says Lorenzana.

Seen largely as a preview to a grander solo show in September 2010, 'The Midnight Lullaby' combines the artist's technical application of the play between light and shadow, while staying true to his pop art, animation and surreal imagery influences.

"I'm fascinated with clowns - so deep, tragic, mysterious, and alone. So many different emotions can be expressed just by using a clown's face."

'The Midnight Lullaby' opens at 6 pm on Friday, December 11, 2009, and runs until January 09 at SLab's 20Square Gallery.

'The Midnight Lullaby' will be shown alongside Singapore International Photography Festival at Silverlens Gallery and Indivisibilis by Gary-Ross Pastrana at SLab. 

For inquiries, contact Silverlens Gallery at 2/F YMC Bldg. II, 2320 Pasong Tamo Ext., Makati, 816-0044, 0917-5874011, or manage@silverlensphoto.com. Gallery hours are Monday to Friday 10am–7pm and Saturdays 1-6pm. www.silverlensphoto.com / slab.silverlensphoto.com.

Rachel Rillo Breaks It Down With ‘GRAIN’

Rachel Rillo opens her latest photography exhibit, ‘GRAIN,’ on November 18, 6pm at Silverlens Gallery.

Her latest work is a meditation on paring things down to their material source: plaster, wood, plastic. Objects photographed are small figures that are visual representations of something real.  With the use of light alone, Rillo intentionally alters and deletes backgrounds and other contextual hints. Size, the environment and any other relationship the object photographed could have outside of the material from which it is made and what it symbolizes has been negated.

“Photographically, this particular work was a challenge because I had to get rid of all clues surrounding the object.  The task was to make the photographs as minimal as I could get them to be without touching them up or altering them with light,” says Rillo.

GRAIN is a glimpse into the quiet truths in the most basic of equations. A cube with a triangular top is instantly a symbol of a house.  A rounded figure on a shaft is a bust symbolizing a human form.

There are installations of photographs of religious iconography paired with a small plastic bag of ground, melted, pulverized, and pulped material.  Assuming that the bag holds part of the subject, the photographer posits the questions: Has the idol, icon, or symbol lost its meaning?  Is it sacrilege?  Is it a gram of dirt or a holy gram?

GRAIN is a meditation on the elusive gestures of form and material - the nuanced expression, the violent confrontation, the abandoned and scarred.  It is a reflection of the disjunctive spaces between symbolism and spirituality, memory and possession.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

RACHEL RILLO graduated from the Academy of Art College, San Francisco. In 2000 she moved to Los Angeles to work as a freelance photographer for the television industry. Her clients include FOX TV, UPN, CBS and NBC shooting publicity photographs for the news and shows. Her photography has been published in the Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Magazine, La Opinion, and other major publications in the LA area. In the15 years of living in the US, Rachel Rillo has shown her fine art work in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Houston. Her work has also been shown at the Silverlens Gallery in Manila, UTS Gallery in Sydney, Australia, and will be shown in Pulse Miami this December.

Isa Lorenzo, 004: RELEASE

Largely a physical reaction to her time as a recipient of the Japan Foundation Jenesys Program Creator-in-Residence at Tokyo Wonder Site, Isa Lorenzo’s ‘RELEASE’ explores the underside of the Japanese cultural identity – one that prioritizes homogeneity and conformity - and probes human expressions for “letting one’s hair down,” and “blowing off steam.”

Using the Philippines as her reference point, the artist observed that the assimilated group identity in Japan supersedes the individual’s identity. They have a saying: the nail that sticks out is hammered hardest. As a reaction to societal homogeneity, their “expressions for releasing control are extreme in Japan through subcultures—fetish, cosplay, and wota.  As the title suggests, my work for this show takes off from this premise of releasing control,” says Lorenzo.

The photograms in RELEASE are from printed material ubiquitous to public spaces: tear sheets, exhibition flyers, performance advertising.  They are layered aesthetically and printed correctly with the corresponding tonalities.  Half of the pieces in ‘RELEASE, she leaves unaltered. They remain controlled. The other half, she disrupts the perfect layering and printing by using micro explosives - a release control from the darkroom.

Followers of Lorenzo’s work will notice that each piece is titled with a word or two – a marked departure from her pattern of leaving works numbered or dated.   Lorenzo says, “the series is a set of traditional and universal symbols but are also personal talismans to move ahead in life”.  ‘RELEASE’ is a collective set of accidents and mistakes, of images disrupted, of spontaneous signifiers.

Isa Lorenzo’s RELEASE will run from November 18 to December 05 at Slab’s 20Square and will be shown alongside Rachel Rillo’s ‘GRAIN’ at the Silverlens Gallery across the bridge.  

For inquiries and more information on RELEASE, please contact Cathy Paras-Lara at communications@silverlensphoto.com or 816-0044.

Image: (left) Rachel Rillo, House 1, 2009, (right) Isa Lorenzo, Empress, 2009

Rachel Rillo Breaks It Down With ‘GRAIN’

Rachel Rillo opens her latest photography exhibit, ‘GRAIN,’ on November 18, 6pm at Silverlens Gallery.

Her latest work is a meditation on paring things down to their material source: plaster, wood, plastic. Objects photographed are small figures that are visual representations of something real.  With the use of light alone, Rillo intentionally alters and deletes backgrounds and other contextual hints. Size, the environment and any other relationship the object photographed could have outside of the material from which it is made and what it symbolizes has been negated.

“Photographically, this particular work was a challenge because I had to get rid of all clues surrounding the object.  The task was to make the photographs as minimal as I could get them to be without touching them up or altering them with light,” says Rillo.

GRAIN is a glimpse into the quiet truths in the most basic of equations. A cube with a triangular top is instantly a symbol of a house.  A rounded figure on a shaft is a bust symbolizing a human form.

There are installations of photographs of religious iconography paired with a small plastic bag of ground, melted, pulverized, and pulped material.  Assuming that the bag holds part of the subject, the photographer posits the questions: Has the idol, icon, or symbol lost its meaning?  Is it sacrilege?  Is it a gram of dirt or a holy gram?

GRAIN is a meditation on the elusive gestures of form and material - the nuanced expression, the violent confrontation, the abandoned and scarred.  It is a reflection of the disjunctive spaces between symbolism and spirituality, memory and possession.


ABOUT THE ARTIST

RACHEL RILLO graduated from the Academy of Art College, San Francisco. In 2000 she moved to Los Angeles to work as a freelance photographer for the television industry. Her clients include FOX TV, UPN, CBS and NBC shooting publicity photographs for the news and shows. Her photography has been published in the Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Magazine, La Opinion, and other major publications in the LA area. In the15 years of living in the US, Rachel Rillo has shown her fine art work in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Houston. Her work has also been shown at the Silverlens Gallery in Manila, UTS Gallery in Sydney, Australia, and will be shown in Pulse Miami this December.

Image: Rachel Rillo, House 1, 2009

Isa Lorenzo, 004: RELEASE

Largely a physical reaction to her time as a recipient of the Japan Foundation Jenesys Program Creator-in-Residence at Tokyo Wonder Site, Isa Lorenzo’s ‘RELEASE’ explores the underside of the Japanese cultural identity – one that prioritizes homogeneity and conformity - and probes human expressions for “letting one’s hair down,” and “blowing off steam.”

Using the Philippines as her reference point, the artist observed that the assimilated group identity in Japan supersedes the individual’s identity. They have a saying: the nail that sticks out is hammered hardest. As a reaction to societal homogeneity, their “expressions for releasing control are extreme in Japan through subcultures—fetish, cosplay, and wota.  As the title suggests, my work for this show takes off from this premise of releasing control,” says Lorenzo.

The photograms in RELEASE are from printed material ubiquitous to public spaces: tear sheets, exhibition flyers, performance advertising.  They are layered aesthetically and printed correctly with the corresponding tonalities.  Half of the pieces in ‘RELEASE, she leaves unaltered. They remain controlled. The other half, she disrupts the perfect layering and printing by using micro explosives - a release control from the darkroom.

Followers of Lorenzo’s work will notice that each piece is titled with a word or two – a marked departure from her pattern of leaving works numbered or dated.   Lorenzo says, “the series is a set of traditional and universal symbols but are also personal talismans to move ahead in life”.  ‘RELEASE’ is a collective set of accidents and mistakes, of images disrupted, of spontaneous signifiers.

Isa Lorenzo’s RELEASE will run from November 18 to December 05 at Slab’s 20Square and will be shown alongside Rachel Rillo’s ‘GRAIN’ at the Silverlens Gallery across the bridge.  

For inquiries and more information on RELEASE, please contact Cathy Paras-Lara at communications@silverlensphoto.com or 816-0044.

Image: Isa Lorenzo, Empress, 2009

Bridging the Arts and the Sciences

Be here when the arts and sciences walk and talk a common path. In a rare conversation, a panel of artists and scientists will explore with the audience what it means to be creative in their respective fields.

Do they both experience eureka moments? If they do, do these moments come with a big bang or lightly on tiptoe? In what measure is creativity genetic or nurtured? Is it absolutely essential that society support the artist and scientist so they can excel at what they do?

Maria Isabel Garcia, curator of The Mind Museum at Taguig, will mediate this risky rendezvous between artists and scientists. Gilda Cordero-Fernando will conduct a creative exercise-join panel discussion. This activity caps the art exhibit Philippines, Oh My! Philippines of GCF.

The event is free of charge but reservations are required. Please contact Leonore Casuga at 8160044 or email us at manage@silverlensphoto.com.

Image: Gilda Cordero-Fernando, Miss Philippines between Two Colonizers, 2009