To celebrate the 45th anniversary of Primex Printers, Chief Marketing Officer Mariel Ching and Creative Director Gio Prado put together The Infinite Dot. The exhibit functions as a showcase of the capabilities of modern-day fine art printing, giving audiences a taste of the flexibility of the form to different ideas.
The exhibit’s name comes from old printing methods where printed materials like newspapers and comic books would be made up of thousands of small dots put together to create an image. Those dots, in this case, represent the evolution of the company’s methods
“When my grandfather started Primex 45 years ago, he came from very meager means, and printing in its most honest and truest form is millions of dots put together,” Prado said. “And 45 years later, […] we’ve fostered so many great relationships because of these dots. This is a great way to celebrate and ribbon everything together.”
“A dot [is something] which has no beginning and has no end,” Ching added. “We believe that through productive and creative collaboration, the possibilities are infinite.”
Ching and Prado had been in talks to create the exhibit since May of last year, and both came to the project with the desire to capture the possibilities of print in art. The two received guidance from Prado’s sister, artist Gabby Prado, who also contributed to the exhibit. Since this was the two’s first art exhibition, they wanted to get as many details right as possible on their first try.
“The real eye-opener was when we did the exhibit we worked with Secret Fresh Gallery to exhibit Sabel pieces of BenCab,” Ching said. “Then, we realized that there is so much potential in fine art.”
Over ten people came together to participate in the exhibition. From fashion industry creatives like Michelle Lao from SOLANO Lamps and Jo Ann Bitagcol, to experimental creators like Celine Lee and Miguel Lorenzo Uy, each of the contributors provides their own unique spin at fine art prints in different mediums and contexts.
“They’re all friends, pero most of them we consider as family because we’ve known them for such a long time,” Prado said. “And the partnership and the collaboration of ideas was very natural just because they’ve seen the company grow in recent years. And they’re very familiar with our aspirations as an evolving company.”
There’s nothing typical about The Infinite Dot, as it varies in its execution of its concept, from fabrics and acrylics to functional furniture with an imaginative aesthetic twist. Each artist has a differentiating approach that takes advantage of Primex Printers and their resources.
Celine Lee, for example, utilized offset printing to craft a picture of the ocean waters. Her work is unique because she printed it in five layers of heavy acrylic, with each layer using dots of a specific color to make the image blossom into its final form.
“In offset printing, to be able to print a colored image, we have to color separate it into the four basic colors, which are cyan, magenta, yellow, black,” Ching shared. “This image was supplied by Celine, and she asked us to print [a] cyan, magenta, yellow, [and] black screens of the image on four layers of acrylic.
“It was a very heavy piece because of the four layers of acrylic plus a white acrylic that served as a backing. I think it took us about three hours to install because it was so heavy,” she continued.
Luis Antonio Santos also contributed a work for the exhibit, which was printed on clear acrylic and mimicked the look of glass breaking. Ching shared that the angle and lighting was chosen by Santos to give it a more dramatic effect for spectators.
Artists like Kitty Bunag and Miguel Lorenzo Uy also shared some of their works for the exhibit. Bunag worked with sheer fabric to print some of her photographs to hang like curtains in the space, while Uy printed a scanned copy of his DNA on reflective fabrics.
“There’s so much that we could say that we can do,” Prado said. “And it’s a lot easier for us to just say na, why don’t you tell us what you need? And then we’ll tell you if we can or can’t do it. Whatever it is that you need. I think it’s a lot easier to narrow down.”
The Infinite Dot serves as a calling card for the capabilities of Primex Printers. The different materials they print on, from glassworks and acrylic to fabrics and wood, provide artists with a proof of concept of just how much they can let their imaginations go wild with the technological capabilities of today.
Ching and Prado beamed with pride at how effectively the printers brought the artists’ works to life. They pointed towards the woodcut work contributed by Camille Ver as proof. She had sent photographs of her artwork to them, and they printed it on wood using a flatbed printer.
The two marvelled at the precision of the recreation of Ver’s paintings on the wood. Since it could only print on top, Ver had to paint on the sides later on for continuity, which creates a great comparison point for how accurate the printed materials are.
“I think this also is a good exhibition of how well the machine that we have prints, the quality that it gives out,” Prado said. “You could hardly tell which is printed [and] which is painted. One of the hardest things to achieve [with a] UV flatbed printer is the vibrance of colors, which paint naman is very good at.”
“ I think that’s the goal,” Ching added later on. “We really want to take fine art printing as part of our services, so to speak.”
Primex Printers even showcased some of their in-house work from Gio and Gabby Prado. Part of the exhibit are Welcome Stools, a product of Gio Prado’s Exploratory Projects under the company. Made up of 12-mm birch plywood that buyers can assemble themselves, these stools were specially-designed by Gabby Prado, with her scribbles printed directly on the wood itself.
The Infinite Dot surged forward with confidence in its showcase of fine art printing. Its curation and precision with the artists and artworks featured were such that Ching and Prado received questions from galleries, artists, and museums about their next exhibition, and offers for collaboration on the next one.
Neither have thought of the next exhibit, but the two were humbled by the overwhelming positive reception from the art world. Currently the two are regrouping to see how they can move forward from this point.
“It was never meant to be anything more than a celebration of the 45 years [of Primex Printers],” Prado said.
“We’ll see what the future holds,” Ching added. “Definitely, it will not end here. But what exactly, we have yet to figure it out.”
Photos by Excel Panlaque.
Related reading: STPI and The Met Inaugurate New Exhibit, ‘Chances of Contact’
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