Zero In Opens Up!

The ten-year old museum consortium Zero In (made up of Ateneo Art Gallery, Ayala Museum, Bahay Tsinoy, Lopez Museum, and Museo Pambata) takes to the mammoth Mall of Asia this September 15-24, 2011 for Zero In: Open Call. Literally venturing out of their comfort zones and physical neighbourhoods ranging from Quezon City to Manila, these five museums each issued open calls last year for works to be realized as offsite projects to be done within a core and satellite zones inside the SM Mall of Asia.

The projects variably take off from a broad art spectrum ranging from cuisine (Ateneo Art Gallery), fashion (Ayala Museum), visual art (Bahay Tsinoy), sound (Lopez Museum), and dance (Museo Pambata). These projects hope to enable a re-imagining of the work of museums away from the cliché of static displays within stodgy white-cube spaces perceived as alienating general audiences. In literally taking their work to where people are rather than waiting on them to come to their museums, the Zero In consortium hopes to develop its own capacity to pursue museological agendas in the language and contexts of the everyday. Open Call is the museums' shout-out to audiences  while bracing themselves for the untried and unpredictable. Open Call launches on September 15, 2011, 6PM with gaming, live dance and sound performances, cosplay, and the unveiling of a freedom wall along with the re-launching of the Zero In museums map. Open Call will be complemented by interactive performances on the two weekends that the projects will be freely accessible at the SM Mall of Asia atrium and satellite sites. Mall visitors are encouraged to map out the artists' interventions as they stroll around and encounter the works spread out in places like public lounges and store window facades and in-store modules.

Running in parallel to the SM MOA Open Call projects are the onsite exhibitions within the museums themselves-an interactive food themed-game that takes off from the the permanent collection at the Ateneo Art Gallery, Manga drawings and installations in Manga Realities: Exploring the Art of Japanese Comics Today at Ayala Museum (August 16-October 2, 2011), an installation by Con Cabrera called Kasama at Bahay Tsinoy (September 23-October 23, 2011), performances and sound/media art installations in Reverb exhibition at Lopez Museum (September 12, 2011-April __ 2012), and performances alongside an exhibition of National Artist for Dance Ramon Obusan's memorabilia at Museo Pambata (September 6-October 6, 2011).

Open Call is a collaboration between Zero In, SM Mall of Asia, NCCA, Ka Kuen Chua architectural firm, Adtel Inc. Check out events for more information or call/check out the individual museums' websites for details.