Manny Garibay Wants His Audience to Reexamine Their Beliefs

At the 2025 edition of Art Fair Philippines, Filipino artist and founder of the Linangan Artist Residency Manny Garibay presents an exhibition that investigates various facets of belief, power, and memory.

After a three-hour drive from the noisy streets of Metro Manila, Manny Garibay’s home studio in Alfonso, Cavite, an art-filled space overlooking a nature-shrouded landscape, provided an overwhelming yet grounding sense of peace.

One of the first things we learn about the artist is that he moves through his life prioritizing productivity over consumption. Manny Garibay avoids passive entertainment; the artist does not spend recreational time watching movies, reading books, or scrolling through social media. “I don’t like to think that I’m above it,” Garibay clarifies. “It’s just that it makes me less pressured to have to think all the time of needing to respond, needing to interact.” According to him, he tries as much as possible to create art every day and considers a day without creating a sin. 

This explains the ensuing scene: perusing the artist’s studio is like walking through a living, breathing exhibition. An unfinished cup of coffee rests on a table, surrounded by oil pastels and chalks worn down to their last strokes. Electrical tools hang on the wall alongside various sculptures. His wife Edna’s framed watercolor paintings of the Garibay family, as well as his oil paintings on wood panels, are also displayed. Unpacked but ready to transport in the following weeks are artworks of various sizes, which make up Garibay’s showcase for Art Fair Philippines 2025. 

In “Ganap,” Manny Garibay reimagines Jose Rizal as the Vetruvian Man. In “Katunayan” he mixes modern and postmodern sensibilities to depict Jesus Christ and his apostle Thomas. Photographed by Sela Gonzales

Various materials at Manny Garibay’s studio in Cavite. Photographed by Sela Gonzales

Throughout the conversation, Garibay harkens back to the idea of “the sacred.” Garibay is one of five featured artists in ArtFairPh/Projects, with his own exhibition entitled “‘Dambana’ – A Critical Reflection on Belief, Power, and Memory.” It starts with two massive doors, which Garibay has painted various figures: on one, technocrats Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg, the father of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud, his nephew, the propagandist Edward Bernays, and Homer and J.R.R Tolkien, who depict a vision of “the beginning” and “the end.”

Garibay is very intentional with his representation of forms and ideas. There is a painting of two figures on a crucifix: Jesus and Thomas, neither of whom are depicted with the familiar Eurocentric features in popular culture. The only identifiable mark is one of the pair displaying the wound in his palm to the other. However, Garibay’s apostle is more disinterested than doubting. “[Jesus] is practically begging for Thomas to acknowledge that he exists,” Garibay points out. “But the other guy, he doesn’t really seem to care.”

In conversation, he amusingly continues to refer to oft-glorified figures in history and popular culture as “these guys.” Not only does he challenge the beliefs the audiences have about these figures, he also humanizes them. To punctuate this point, his depiction of Dr. Jose Rizal as Da Vinci’s Vetruvian Man in “Ganap” is a distinctive take on the national hero.

Filipino artist and founder of Linangan Art Residency Manny Garibay. Photographed by Sela Gonzales

“I like the idea of a ‘naked Rizal.’ We often see Rizal as fully clothed, with his overcoat…” He points out the humor in this, as it is quite inconvenient to constantly wear this type of clothing in tropical Philippines. Garibay says that this common depiction of Rizal as foreign was to widen his distance from being Filipino. “That’s the point, the deliberate creation of idols. When you create idols, they’re meant to be looked up, worshipped, and seen from a distance. That’s how you relate to them,” he further explains. “Models are there to be followed. Rizal was not intended to be a model.”

Although it seems commonplace when an artist is present to ask about what their work means or depicts, Garibay probes to see what the work means for the viewer. “I have [an] eagerness to [have] an exchange of ideas. If it starts with my work, fine,” he says. “But I like to take the conversations beyond that.”

He walks the team through his painting called “Himbing,” in which the figure Mnemosyne is surrounded by her daughters, the nine Muses, depicted as lost and disoriented. Accompanying it are various mixed media collages of various Filipino writers and artists, intentionally obscured. “If the current generation is looking at it, they will realize that they are in the same place as the muses are. There is a general condition of loss of memory.” Garibay explains. “The generation is wrestling with the issue of the sacred, what to believe in.”

In “Himbing,” Manny Garibay reimagines the depiction of the nine muses. Photographed by Sela Gonzales

What, then, does Manny Garibay believe in? Throughout his life, the artist observed how doctrines are used to oppress and exploit people. “I’m quite deterred by doctrines because it absolutizes. Instead of making it dynamic, it becomes stagnant.” Garibay says that what he believes in the most is the power of humanity. “I’m always optimistic, actually,” he remarks. “Mainly because throughout history, you realize how resilient humanity is. That, to me, is the most promising realization, especially if we engage each other with more ideas that give us a stronger definition of who we are.”

Garibay muses on the connection between belief and community. “When you subscribe to a belief, no matter how personal it is, you find out that other people share that kind of belief,” he says. “That’s belonging. And belongingness is a major need for people. We all need to belong to someone, to somebody, something.” His wealth of knowledge, experiences, and insights found a home in the establishment of the Linangan Art Residency, an initiative founded and run by the Garibay family in Cavite. The conception of the residency, as Garibay recalls, started as discussions among his family in their home. Hoping to share more of their knowledge with other artists, especially in faraway provinces and regions, the family opened applications to artists all over the Philippines.

“Paraluman VIII ( Leonor Orosa-Goquingco )” and “Paraluman IV ( Francisco Balagtas )” by Manny Garibay are multi-media assemblages that accompany Manny Garibay’s painting “Himbing.” Photographed by Sela Gonzales

Paintbrushes and linseed drying oil at Manny Garibay’s studio. Photographed by Sela Gonzales

Chanel Pepino, the current communications and research development officer at Linangan, was a former resident. She was living in between jobs in Cebu at the time of her application in late 2023, and traveled to Cavite soon after she was accepted. Almost a year after her fellowship period ended, Pepino chose to stay with the Garibay family and work full-time as a faculty member at the residency.

At Linangan, she improved her discipline in her art practice and found mentors and peers among the Garibay family and her fellow residents, but it was the opportunity to be involved in community-building projects outside of the residency that convinced her to stay. “When you build communities that are empowered, and they know what their community needs, maybe our connections with them can help them be stronger.” Pepino reflects on Filipino artists in the margins who feel disempowered because of the lack of funding and a network.

Various artist studio spaces for the participants of this year’s edition of the Linangan Art Residency. Photographed by Sela Gonzales

“Sir Manny realized that he can sustain himself and his family. He sent all his children to school with his income from art. So he said, why not do this for other artists?” She talks highly of the Garibay family and their approach to life, and how it is aspirational. “Some artists who become rich and famous, they travel the world, buy houses, buy cars. But [Manny] saw his means as a way to help others. To him, he found that more fulfilling and empowering than to just enrich himself, because what is the point of accumulating all of these worldly things when after you pass, you won’t take them with you?”

It is a disservice to look at the work of an artist such as Manny Garibay and to expect an immediate answer to all-encompassing questions of the sacred. After all, art exists to ask more questions to understand the world, not necessarily to solve its problems. The existence of his art allows viewers to reexamine their beliefs, while his projects through the Linangan Artist Residency and the generations of artists set to follow in his example provides hope and an aspirational future. There is something sacred here, before his brush even touches the canvas. There is something sacred in his continuous pursuit of knowledge. There is something sacred in him planting the seeds of a legacy and trusting, believing, and making sure it will endure.

Written by Celine Lagundi. Photographs by Sela Gonzales. Digital Multimedia Artist: Bea Lu. Photographer’s Assistant: Jorsette Valespin. Producer: Bianca Zaragoza.

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