The ninth edition opens this Friday, August 7, at its new venue in the Eduardo Westerdahl Museum of Contemporary Art – MACEW (Casa de la Aduana) in Puerto de la Cruz.
“What happens in the Canary Islands is part of a global conversation about ways of living on the planet,” says project curator Beatriz Roca
The Tenerife Phe Festival, whose eleventh edition will be held on September 4 and 5 in the Tenerife municipality of Puerto de la Cruz, inaugurates this Friday, August 7, its parallel activities program, the PheXperiences, with the launch of Phe Gallery, a platform for supporting and giving visibility to emerging art in the Canary Islands. The initiative maintains its commitment to artistic projects that engage with contemporary challenges and treat the artistic act as a tool for reflection, research, and social activation. In this ninth edition, Phe Gallery is changing its location and premiering a new venue at the Eduardo Westerdahl Museum of Contemporary Art – MACEW (Casa de la Aduana) in Puerto de la Cruz, with the launch this Friday the 7th, at 7:00 p.m., of the group exhibition Ways of living featuring work by the 27 artists selected in this call from among more than a hundred proposals received. The exhibition will be open to the public until September 5.
In collaboration with the CajaCanarias Foundation and the Culture Department of Puerto de la Cruz, Phe Gallery 2026 proposes a reflection on the relationship between the natural environment and contemporary ways of life, material research, and practices that reflect on how we inhabit, transform, and care for the environments we share.
There are 27 artists selected in this call curated by Beatriz Roca together with a curatorial team formed by agents from the art world, coming from different fields: M. Lohrum, a Canarian artist specialized in performative drawing; Carlota Neris, a cultural manager, musicologist, and consultant with a career focused on the management of artistic and cultural projects; and Adrián Trujillo, an architect from the Higher Technical School of Architecture of Madrid, who explores the relationships between space, community, and landscape through collaborative processes and social impact projects.
The artists exhibiting their work in Phe Gallery 2026 in the group exhibition Ways of living son: Kernel, Ohiane de Felipe García, Magali Brincat, Marina Sunyer, Irene Suárez, Clara Montesdeoca, Sublime.86, Andrea Moreno González, Laura Santana, Albadortart, Amaia Senante, Uri Reis, Ale Arbizu, Gabriel Gil González, Aitana Spruyt and Paula Alayón De la Rosa, Elena Casanova, Jose Saucedo, Marina Valls, German Paez, Nacho Torres Toledo, Rubén Guedes, Lara García, Cristina García, Denso, Paula Calavera and Juin.
“This year we have moved into the realm of architecture, urban planning, that moment of inhabiting, and not only from the physical standpoint but from the body or the mind, a much broader concept,” explains curator Beatriz Roca. “Every form of inhabiting leaves a trace. Not only on the territory, but also on those who share it. The materials we use, the way we build our cities, the way we move, produce, consume, or care for the environment speak of a certain way of being in the world,” Beatriz Roca points out in the text accompanying the catalog under the title of Inhabit the threshold.
According to the curator, “we live in a time when this relationship is subject to profound tensions,” and in the case of the Canary Islands, “these issues acquire a particular intensity. The island condition makes visible something that perhaps remains hidden in other places: the territory is finite. Every transformation leaves a mark. Every decision modifies a delicate balance between nature, landscape, economy, and community. But it would be a mistake to understand these circumstances solely as a local problem. What happens in the Canary Islands is part of a global conversation about the ways of inhabiting the planet.”.
In this ninth edition of Phe Gallery, all formats and interpretations of the concept of dwelling converge. According to Roca, in the exhibition “there are moments for critique, of personal experiences, biographical, bodily and architectural themes, solutions, history, research regarding the different ways of dwelling we have had throughout the centuries; each artist has their own formula for interpreting the concept of dwelling.” Overall, it is a catalog of male and female creators with diverse perspectives among whom “there are new and familiar faces as well, and artists who are returning because what is valued is the proposal,” the curator points out.
The inauguration of Phe Gallery this Friday at the Eduardo Westerdahl Contemporary Art Museum – MACEW (Casa de la Aduana) will feature the presence of the artists and a painting performance in the museum space itself, led by Juin and Paula Calavera, who will create a work in situ, in addition to a DJ set by Andrés Morales. “It will take place in the museum's inner courtyard, giving greater importance to the exhibition and the space where we are opening,” Beatriz Roca emphasizes. In her view, “the temporary sculptural installation located in the square turns the access to MACEW into a space of shared creation, making the times of artistic labor visible and shifting part of the exhibition experience to the public space. The museum is no longer understood solely as a place for contemplation, but becomes a space for encounter, transit, and conversation.”.
The relocation of Phe Gallery gives a new dimension to the project. A more central museum space connected to the festival and its surroundings right in the fishing dock of Puerto de la Cruz, which makes it the fourth stage of Phe Club. “With the change, Phe Gallery is at the core where everything happens, in the nerve center of all the action of Phe Festival, and I think it is very important to strengthen the project. From the venue itself you can see the festival, and we have gone from a plural and multipurpose center like the Castillo de San Felipe to a museum center with everything that entails,” emphasizes curator Beatriz Roca.
Guided tours and Gallery Talks‘
Two guided tours of Phe Gallery 2026 with the curator have been scheduled: the first on Friday the 7th after the opening, and another on Saturday, September 5, during the second day of Phe Festival and the closing of the exhibition. In addition, a meeting will be held on Wednesday, September 2. Gallery Talks, “with relevant or curious artists and projects” and a performance.