My Favorite Piece from 2010, The Year The Museums Showed Us How

Detail, "Balete" by Leeroy New

We saw some pretty good stuff in 2010, the year that just seemed to whiz by. I thought the museums led the way, bringing us well-mounted exhibits that made art watching both exciting and gratifying. The Vargas Museum started their 2010 exhibit line-up in February with Stock, a show of works by Alfredo and Isabel Aquilizan, then had Bound and Bomba in June, and ended the year with Rodel Tapaya’s Bulaklak ng Dila. The Yuchengco Museum gave us Santi Bose’s retrospective, Remix, in February, and combined art and design with Pumapapel, an exhibit of works on paper, in July. The Lopez Museum culminated their 50th Anniversary in November by inviting street artists to show their stuff for Extensions. Meanwhile, the Ateneo Art Gallery celebrated their own 50th by inaugurating their brand new space in October with the super Lee Aguinaldo retrospective.

Another detail, Balete

So perhaps it comes as no surprise that my favorite piece of 2010 comes from a museum exhibit: Leeroy New’s Balete at the Ateneo Art Gallery. This marked Leeroy’s return from the residency grant he undertook as part of his 2009 Ateneo Art Awards win. It went on view from July to October. As I said before, this was just so galing!

Happy New Year!