Fashion and art have always been inextricably linked throughout history, and Art Underground made no reservations in blurring the lines between canvas and cloth for their 10th Anniversary.
In an intimate event held last June 7, 2025 on the 5th Floor of the Philippine Stock Exchange Tower in Bonifacio Global City, Art Underground showcased the dynamic partnerships of Arce x Joe San Antonio and SAIS x Daryl Maat, unveiling the seamless collaborations between Filipino contemporary artists and fashion designers.
The show unveiled original canvas works alongside modern fashion, each piece echoing the spirit and language of its counterpart. Arce’s sculptural, emotive masterpieces breathe life into Joe San Antonio’s graceful silhouettes, while SAIS’ monochromatic musings on identity and unity find their sartorial reflection in Daryl Maat’s contemporary, structured forms.
The result was a conversation where pigment and fabric speak as one, and where two disciplines embrace each other’s nuances in a celebration of vision and craft, and a symphony of brushstrokes and drapery, an ode to mutual respect, artistic synergy, and creative courage.
Deseree Mangulabnan, Gallery Manager at Art Underground, stated that the artists and designers were a “perfect fit” for each other, allowing their works, shared visions, and styles to blend seamlessly into stunning pieces.
"Tambour" by Arce and Joe San Antonio
Arce’s works of dimension, movement, and texture meet Joe San Antonio’s intricate fluidity in “Tambour.”
Traditionally used to keep the fabric taut during needlework, the tambour frame becomes a metaphor for the creative process itself: the tension required for beauty to unfold, the stillness necessary for precision, and the structure within which intricacy takes shape.
Arce’s visual compositions and richly textured artworks investigate the tambour as a space where artistry and reflection merge, each echoing a reflection on fragility and foundation.
Joe San Antonio, known for her romantic and lyrical silhouettes, extends this ethos into fashion, treating fabric as a medium and thread as the narrative.
Together, Arce and Joe present “Tambour” as a composed homage to the virtues of precision and patience, a celebration of the threshold where contemporary art and couture meet. It is an ode to the craftsmanship of becoming, where lives, like textiles and paintings, are shaped through intention, detail, and a steady hand.
“Guhit ng Gunita” by SAIS x Daryl Maat
Childlike wonder and a nostalgic longing for one’s youth takes centerstage in “Guhit ng Gunita.”
Daryl Maat revisits his formative years by deconstructing and reweaving the school uniform with motifs rippling between nostalgia and rebellion. Traditional silhouettes, pleated skirts, crisp collars, and the translucent barong are contrasted with whimsical embroidery patterns, calling back to a time when creatively flowed fiercely.
SAIS complements this vision through his portraits of wide-eyed children, mirroring the emotional texture of memory, rendered in charcoal and softened by time. His imagery evokes the meaning of what it means to be young, impressionable, and perpetually in flux.
Together, “Guhit ng Gunita” creates a landscape of remembrance and memory that is neither literal nor linear. It is an elegy to imagination’s first bloom, a tribute to the years that have shaped humanity, and the unrefined beauty of our earliest marks on the world.
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