MISSIONARY VISUAL ARTIST KRISTINE LIM IN SAN FRANCISCO FOR LONE U.S. STOP OF KUWENTO NG ALON WORLD TOUR
SAN FRANCISCO, USA – The Philippine Consulate General and Sentro Rizal San Francisco hosted the opening of the San Francisco leg of the Kuwento ng Alon (As Told By the Waves) world tour on 9 August 2023 at the Philippine Center’s Kalayaan Hall.
The Kuwento ng Alon project is a collaboration between missionary visual artist Kristine Lim and songwriter & record producer Jonathan Manalo, in which the former interprets the latter’s songs as a series of artworks. Manalo wrote and composed the theme songs of ABS-CBN shows such as “Tara Tena,” “Pinoy Big Brother,” and “FPJ’s Ang Probinsiyano.”
Philippine Consul General in San Francisco Neil Ferrer welcomed Lim to San Francisco, and expressed his gratitude for choosing San Francisco for the first and only U.S. stop of the Kuwento ng Alon world tour.
Said Consul General Ferrer: “As you may glean later in Kristine’s one-of-a-kind work, waves are the central imagery which ties the project together… The Philippines’ 7,641 islands are connected by waves, whose ebb and flow carry with it the hopes and dreams of Filipinos who traverse our seas. The same waves have also brought our people to lands far and wide—including here in California, where Filipinos first arrived in continental United States in 1587.”
“Thus, Kuwento ng Alon is the story of the Filipino people, rendered in music and in visual art,” Consul General Ferrer said.
“I thank Kristine for her generous donation of Kuwento ng Alon artworks to the Consulate, in support of Philippine cultural diplomacy efforts in the Bay Area,” Consul General Ferrer added.
For her part, Lim said that the Kuwento ng Alon world tour is also about “global Filipinos who are making waves around the world, and are contributing immensely in the countries where they have decided to live and work.”
During the exhibition launch, the Consulate offered attendees a Philippine coffee tasting experience courtesy of Southern California-based, Filipino American-owned Teofilo Coffee Company. This follows the recently concluded Philippine coffee tasting event at the Philippine Center on 2 August 2023.
The Kuwento ng Alon art exhibit, which features 12 15”x15” artworks from Ms. Lim, ran at the Philippine Center until 10 August 2023. Lim also joined the 30th Pistahan Festival—one of the largest Philippine cultural events in the United States—at the Yerba Buena Gardens in San Francisco on 12-13 August 2023, as one of the featured artists in the Arts Pavilion.
Previous stops of the Kuwento ng Alon tour include: Sydney, Australia; Tokyo, Japan; Singapore; Beijing, China; and Ottawa, Canada.
Lim is an award-winning visual artist with a mission to evangelize through her artworks as well as to champion sustainable living, edenic living, mental health wellness, and patriotism. She has done missionary and charity work, and has been spearheading art workshops to orphans and marginalized sectors of the community. END
