Artistic experimentation focus of brand-new Rift Gallery

A PATCHWORK banner representing generations of women, paintings that stitch together memory and trauma, and sculptures and video works depicting ecological crises are just some of the pieces on view at the newly opened Rift Gallery, located along EDSA.

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OPEN CITY banner by Carla Gamalinda

Titled rift / making through the cracks, the gallery’s inaugural exhibit features works by Laura Abejo, Aiess Alonso, Nathalie Dagmang, Carla Gamalinda, Nicolei Buendia Gupit, Solana Lim Perez, and Kestrel Reyes.

They can be found on the second floor of the historic VV. Soliven Building, one of the first structures built along EDSA, just a few steps away from the Santolan-Annapolis MRT station. Those who regularly traverse the capital’s expansive avenue may find it strange to finally enter an old building that they usually ignore, but the works of art that await in the quaint gallery space are worth it.

Carla Gamalinda’s banner Open City greets guests with a large sign made of stitched-together fabric of various colors. According to the artist, she put it together from pieces in her grandmother's wardrobe, using her great-grandmother’s 1920s sewing machine left in their ancestral home.

Ms. Gamalinda explained that she had to “relearn how to use the old machine,” which required help from her mother. This means the work involves four generations of women, reflecting a politics of care.

“I cut up the fabric and stitched together a process of destruction and reconstruction,” she said in her artist’s statement. “When you study the stitches, you can see my learning curve: some of them are shabby while some show that I have gotten a grip on the machine already.”

The banner becoming the sort of centerpiece of Rift Gallery’s first show was very important, according to Carissa Pobre, one of the gallery’s owners and the curator of the exhibit.

“A few months ago, we put together a call for different artists who might want to join our inaugural exhibition, with a prompt centered on the concept of ‘a rift,” she told BusinessWorld during a visit in December.