A First-Timer's Guide to Manila's Gallery Row

The contemporary art that matters in Metro Manila sits in a cluster of converted warehouses along Chino Roces Avenue in Makati. Here is how to see it in an afternoon, and where the major museums fit in.

Most of the contemporary art worth seeing in Metro Manila is concentrated along a single stretch of Chino Roces Avenue Extension in Makati. The galleries occupy old warehouses and light-industrial buildings, several of them within walking distance of one another. Entry is free. You can see the serious rooms in an afternoon, and unlike the museums, the galleries change their shows every few weeks, so the work is current.

This guide assumes you have a free weekday afternoon and want to understand what is here, rather than tick off a list.

The Chino Roces cluster

Start at Silverlens, at 2263 Don Chino Roces Avenue Extension. Founded by Isa Lorenzo in 2004, with Rachel Rillo joining as co-director in 2007, it is the gallery that has done the most to place Filipino artists in front of international audiences, and it now also runs a space in New York. The Makati room is large and well lit, and the programme leans toward established and mid-career names. It opens Tuesday to Saturday, ten to six. This is the right place to calibrate your eye before seeing anything else.

From there, walk to Karrivin Plaza at 2316 Chino Roces Avenue Extension, a converted complex that houses two of the city's strongest galleries under one roof. Artinformal, led by Tina Fernandez, opened its Makati space in 2018 and runs three exhibition rooms across painting, sculpture, ceramics and installation. In the same building is The Drawing Room, founded by Cesar Villalon Jr. in 1998. It began by showing only works on paper, which is where the name comes from, and its current space gives each piece room and natural light. Both galleries take part in fairs in Hong Kong, Singapore and beyond, so the work you see is often the same work being shown abroad.

A short walk away is the La Fuerza Compound at 2241 Chino Roces Avenue, an older cluster of warehouses. Finale Art File occupies Warehouse 17, just inside Gate 1. It has been showing contemporary work since the 1980s, across a space of around 450 square metres divided into three galleries, and it opens longer hours than most, Monday to Saturday, ten to seven. La Fuerza also holds smaller spaces worth a look if a show catches your eye.

A practical note. Galleries here close between exhibitions, and openings draw crowds that make quiet viewing difficult. Check each gallery's current show online before you set out, and go on a weekday if you can. Bring water. The walk between buildings is short but the Makati afternoon is hot, and there is little shade on Chino Roces.

When to add a museum

The galleries show what is being made now. For depth and context, the city has three museums, none of them on Gallery Row itself.

The Ayala Museum sits beside Greenbelt Park in the Makati central business district, a few minutes by car from Chino Roces. It reopened in late 2021 after a long renovation. The permanent draw is the Gold of Ancestors collection, more than a thousand pre-colonial gold objects, alongside a set of handcrafted dioramas that run through Philippine history. It opens Tuesday to Sunday, ten to six, and unlike the galleries it charges admission. If you have time for only one museum, this is the one that explains the country.

For contemporary work in an institutional setting, the Museum of Contemporary Art and Design, known as MCAD, is on the ground floor of the De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde campus on Dominga Street in Malate, across the river toward Manila proper. Admission is free, and it opens Tuesday to Saturday, ten to six, and Sunday, ten to two. The programme is ambitious and often international.

The Metropolitan Museum of Manila, now styled The M, is the outlier in distance. It moved in 2022 to the MK Tan Centre on 30th Street in Bonifacio Global City, Taguig, and is marking its fiftieth year in 2026. Pair it with a separate BGC afternoon rather than the Makati walk.

How to spend the afternoon

A clean plan: arrive at Silverlens around two, walk to Karrivin Plaza, then to La Fuerza, finishing by five. If you want a museum, swap one gallery stop for the Ayala Museum, which keeps the same hours and sits a short ride away. End with coffee or an early drink in the Karrivin or Poblacion area nearby. The whole circuit asks for comfortable shoes, a charged phone for the gallery listings, and no particular knowledge. The work does the rest.