This last month on Cartellino, Nina Garibay presented I’m Not There, a collection treading the fine lines between vulnerability and strength, as she reflects on inner turmoils and surveys the veneer of vanity that impel us to question our sense of self.
The artist’s affinity with the art of collage prevails in her latest collection of paintings, as her figures emerge the pastiches of various, at times unlikely, elements. What Garibay plays around with here, it seems, are the roles of chance and choice not just in artmaking, but in crafting our very existence: the art of “being physically present but mentally or emotionally absent, or using an avatar to stand in for yourself”.
Although she is foremost a painter, it is in collaging that Garibay finds her starting point. “Collages deal with ready-made images, they are like prompts,” she states. Things come together as pieces come apart, as in ransom notes where disparate words and letters are painstakingly sought, collected, and pieced together. Only then is a very particular message not only conveyed but, as is usually the case, discovered.
As with many of her past works, Garibay’s distinct sartorial sensibilities, drawn from her background in Advertising, coalesce with her surrealist whimsy in I’m Not There. In the artist’s own words, the works feature figures clad in “low-budget cosplay where one mashes together an improvised facade”. The domestic mise-en-scene, for Garibay, serves as the fitting backdrop to unpack such pretenses, as she continues: “What is it that we’re so afraid of that we hide ourselves under such outlandish costumes? Even the intimate setting of the home is not exempt from scrutiny.”
As Mara Fabella writes in her solo release notes, “A costume perhaps, turned more into a shield when placed in a comfortable setting or cozy home. Through her works, Garibay reflects upon why we often feel the need to hide ourselves even in the most personal of settings”.
As a storyteller, there is an unmistakable literariness (and literalness) in Garibay’s visual eloquence. Her figures morphed into modish grotesques may bring to mind the Kafkaesque. While Garibay does not endorse any single storyline for these (she goes so far as to say that she “hardly [considers] how it [her work] may make sense for other people”), and would prefer to let interpretations emerge specially from one reader to another, she shares that her own filmic vision for the pieces appear like a “recollection of a random afternoon coming home after school”. It unfolds as follows:
Like an establishing shot of a domestic interior might begin with the Great Indoors.
Then a character comes in... ‘Anybody home(?)’
Of course and someone is waiting—‘Tea time’
On the wall, there is ‘The Moth’
A stranger shows up, looks like we've got a ‘Visitor’
Then they ‘Play’ a bit
Before they go to bed. ‘Goodnight’.
An alternative storyline transpires “through the lens of violence and surveillance”:
‘The Play’ looks like a scene from Guantanamo, ‘Goodnight’ is the execution. ‘Tea time’ is the interrogation. ‘The Visitor’ is the officer, and the ‘Great Indoors’ is the dream of freedom.
One oddly specific, one strangely universal, Garibay’s storylines meet at the unusual. And she urges viewers to embrace that. “I think we often feel the need to find meaning when we find something unusual,” she shares. “Negative spaces make us want to fill them up.”
In search of the meaningful, the artist implores readers to shift focus from semantics. As she demonstrates with her stories, titles can be guidelines, but should never be seen as limitations. As in every collage, pieces are cut up and emancipated from contexts, much like our very presence can exist in various forms. It is up to us how we piece ourselves together—how we get to the titular “There”—that is, the situations we may feel the need to shapeshift in. Or, as Garibay would rather, if we choose to get there at all.
Nina Garibay is currently part of the group show Crosswalk on view at Vinyl on Vinyl in Makati City until October 6. Her Cartellino Solo Release, I’m Not There continues until October 8.
Interview conducted by Mara Fabella. Quotes were edited for clarity and brevity.
About the artist:
Nina Garibay is an alumna of two art schools: the Philippine High School for the Arts and the UP College of Fine Arts. She has held 5 solo exhibits and has participated in several group shows within the country.
She is fascinated by collage's flexibility as a narrative tool to respond to images — fusing, omitting, and elaborating elements. Her process of cutting out magazines and painting is both a form of admiration and an assertion against advertising.