New Galerie Stephanie x Cartellino Opens in Shangri-La Mall
A new collaborative space between local exhibitors Galerie Stephanie and Cartellino opened on February 8. The opening came with a few inaugural exhibits featuring works from artists like Addy Debil, Mr. S, and Hideo Tanaka.
The space, located at the sixth floor of the Shangri-La Plaza Mall, has the capacity for four exhibition rooms. Abby Teotico, Galerie Stephanie’s gallery director hopes that this would mean the gallery can showcase more artworks.
“Now we have four exhibits,” Teotico said. “Before we could only accommodate two, but with more exhibits comes more work but we have much more time to show the work and prepare for them.”
The new space has a minimalist feel, with lots of concrete and neutral colors. Teotico said the new approach was so that people would “come here knowing it’s a new space and not just the same gallery moved to another place.”
Her desire for a unique exhibition space for Galerie Stephanie invigorated the design. She specifically used hard concrete floors as a way of adhering to the minimalist design ethos.
“I’ve wanted to use the concrete floors for a long time, but then before, the technology wasn’t that good because it’s prone to cracking,” she said. “But now I think they have a new technology that doesn’t crack or is very neutral. When I found out about that new technology I immediately wanted that for the gallery.”
The New in the Old
Galerie Stephanie also contains a new space for local art dealer Cartellino. Well-known for their online digest on local art, they are now expanding with their first physical store inside of Galerie Stephanie. Tara Valencia, Cartellino’s creative director, said that this was intentional on the company’s part.
“We’re basically a very young art gallery, so this is our first physical store kaya kailangan talaga na we start small,” she said.
“As you can see, we’re inside a bigger gallery, which is Gallery Stephanie. And the concept behind Cartellino is that, you find Cartellino is a gallery within a gallery. Instead na actually announced outside, it’s actually—it’s sort of a surprise factor when you come in. So, we don’t want to be too loud but we want people to be curious about Cartellino.”
Cartellino’s focus continues to be on creating a space to showcase up-and-coming artists. Their goals also nod towards helping new collectors build their collection. They also hope to expand to new mediums, like art toys, art objects, and merchandise.
“We wanna go big in supporting small artists that are going beyond paper, going beyond canvas, going beyond digital art,” she said.
International and Local Art
For the inaugural opening, Galerie Stephanie featured works from Indonesian artist Addy Debil. Based in Bandung, his works use a cartoon-y visual language influenced by popular culture artifacts like Power Rangers, Rick & Morty, and Godzilla.
“For this show, I’m inspired by intertwined relationships. It’s like, relationship with [your] family, in love, with your friends in [the] office. It’s—it feels like it’s intertwined. You can’t go alone because you’ll need someone in a good and in a bad way. I feel like all the art is intertwined.”
Unfolding Creativity
Meanwhile, Cartellino’s inaugural exhibit “The Little Paper Show,” featured a roster of established and up-and-coming artists contributing artwork made from paper. The exhibit had some of the paper works framed and some of them tied up in transparent string, floating in the middle of the room like a specter.
“‘Little paper kasi yan ang direct translation ng cartellino,” Valencia said. “Kaya itong show natin, almost all of it is made of paper. Paperworks, any medium. So, there’s gauche, there’s watercolor, there’s acrylic, there’s pen, there’s ink.
[“‘Little paper’ is the direct translation of cartellino. For this show almost everything is made of paper. Paperworks, any medium. So, there’s gauche, there’s watercolor, there’s acrylic, there’s pen, there’s ink.”]
“These people don’t normally create small works and some of them don’t normally create on paper but for this show they decided to join and make something.”
Establishment of New Artists
The mix of new and established artists cater well to Cartellino’s goals of showcasing new art. Valencia pointing out that the exhibit features works from Mr. S, whose work was also exhibited that night by Galerie Stephanie, as well as student artists like Tin Javier that the organization wants to support.
“True to our vision, that Cartellino is a platform for up and coming artists, platform siya for young people. So, si Tin is one of the artists that I really want to support,” Valencia said.
In a changing art landscape, the collaborative space Galerie Stephanie x Cartellino looks forward to the future. It’s a space for new and old art collectors, welcoming all kinds of artists, wherever they may come from.
The exhibits will be running until March 3.
Related reading: Otherworldly portraiture by J Consunji at Galerie Joaquin Podium
