‘Kuwento ng Alon’ world tour stops in SF

Consul General Neil Ferrer and missionary visual artist Kristine Lim unveil the main artworks of the Kuwento ng Alon exhibition at the Kalayaan Hall of the Philippine Center in San Francisco. CONTRIBUTED

SAN FRANCISCO – The San Francisco stop of visual artist Kristine Lim and songwriter and record producer Jonathan Manalo’s Kuwento ng Alon (As Told By the Waves) world tour was hosted by Philippine Consulate General and Sentro Rizal Aug. 9 at the Philippine Center’s Kalayaan Hall.

In Kuwento ng Alon, Lim interprets Manalo’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 and thanked her for choosing San Francisco for the first and only U.S. stop of the Kuwento ng Alon world tour and donating project artworks to the Consulate.

Kuwento ng Alon’s “Araw,” “Luwalhati,” and “Pagsinta” limited prints, with a reference to the lyrics of the Philippine National Anthem. CONTRIBUTED

“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,” Ferrer said. “Thus, Kuwento ng Alon is the story of the Filipino people, rendered in music and in visual art.”

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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, attendees had 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  Aug. 2.

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, 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.