Team Manila is quite an elusive entity, constantly credited for its style and technique, yet its members are very rarely acknowledged as individuals, mostly because practically no one knows who or what they really are. To the uninitiated, Team Manila could very well seem like a cult, given how it operates subtly and in silence, never giving away its position, accessible only to a number of extremely loyal constituents. Here’s where we clear the smoke. Team Manila is really just a bunch of normal guys who happen to be extremely skilled at creating really awesome works using pens, paint, and pixels. Joseph "Jowee" Alviar and Raymond "Momon" Punzalan, considered the Team’s founders, discovered their mutual creative chemistry when they paired up for a project in their freshman year at the University of Santo Tomas. The fact that they service a lot of high-profile clients, like BigFish, Human, and Bench/Time, is given. It’s the immense network of willing accomplices they yank into their projects that truly serves to impress.
Set on establishing a graphic design firm that would promote and represent Manila, in a way similar to Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin’s M/M Paris, Jowee and Momon continued to welcome collaborators to the firm’s fold, creating some very special ties along the way. Past collaborators, and consequently official Team Manila members, include top stylist and co-alumnus Millet Arzaga and Paul Guadalupe, a.k.a. Guadakomeda, Pulp magazine’s pixel surgeon-general.
Nearly any piece executed by the group has that rare quality of instant recognition. You can take one look at a shirt, photograph, poster, or invitation, and immediately tell if it’s a Team Manila. The boys very effectively use a couple of distinguishing fonts, stick to a highly characteristic style of illustration, and have a unique way of composing elements on a surface. Call it great design, call it excellent branding. What really matters is the intense impact and visually orgiastic nature of every single Team production.
Deciding that it was high time to slap their works onto wearable pieces, Jowee, Momon, and the others decided to set up shop in the front room of their two-storey house. Graphic Design Lifestyle features items that incorporate objects and images inherent to the canon of Manila culture. Bicycles, balut, jeepneys, Jose Rizal, and other such iconic elements are expressed as printed silhouettes on a wide selection of shirts, zip-bags, totes, laptop protectors, and limited edition prints. "We just wanted to revamp the look of old things, starting with tourist shirts," says Jowee."We saw some local ones that were really just ugly, so we’re trying to come out with works’na nakaka-influence ng tao. We want to influence the way younger graphic designers do their work, but more importantly, we want to change the perception of Manila, as a word and as a concept." A pretty noble cause, if you ask me. And you thought it was just a publicity stunt. For shame!
Team Manila has successfully carved out a place for itself in Philippine culture, filling in the gaps that exist between the various forms of art and creation. Heralded as heroes and exemplars of the graphic design scene, it wouldn’t be much of a surprise if they did end up affecting the way we see art, fashion, and our home city. They enjoy collaborating so much that they’ve even coined a term: every Team Manila collaboration is called a remix. So far, they’ve got publishing, digital design, and rock and roll covered. It’s safe to say that Team currently operates only on the fringes of fashion, but they’re quite interested in combining their delicate creations with haute couture. "We haven’t, as graphic designers, collaborated with fashion designers," says Jowee. "We want to do stuff like transfer designs to couture, you know, apply silkscreen prints to a suit." And who are we to doubt the myriad possibilities of artistic alliance? Team Manila, it seems, is ready for yet another rocking remix.