His eyes, her eyes

I'm overdue for an eye check-up with an opthalmologist provided by my health card. In fact, if it weren't for errands in town, I'm going this morning--can't postpone it any longer.

The lightning-like flashes I'm experiencing within my right eye, clear signs of aging, according to a friend, set me on another course of thinking. How long will my right eye last?

Dad went blind in one eye and could only fathom light but continued his medical practice with the healthy one. It was a complication of diabetes, the family franchise. He had to give up driving though.

What will I have to give up in the future? Should I start studying Braille sometime in the next few weeks?

Meanwhile, here are shots of eyes, some blurred ones caused by movement on my part, that I took this past summer. They're objects in the house I sometimes call home. These eyes include: a pair painted in acrylic by Paolo Francisco, my fine arts classmate and sometime chum from UP Diliman before I continued my studies in Baguio; the laughing eyes of a Bacolod mask; the eyes of Rolly Fernandez from a portrait by Lyra Garcellano; and Buddha eyes to keep me calm and steady.

All photos by Babeth Lolarga

He who makes me laugh makes me young and foolish again

I've tried, I've tried, I've tried in every way I know to lead a more (socially) isolated life. But it is no life, as Kiri Dalena pointed out when I revealed to her how I've repeatedly broken my New Year resolution to be more like my Aunty Social. She said she had a simple resolution for 2013: to take a vacation. She seems to haven't gotten there either. Every trip she makes is an official, i.e., working, one.

On the 16th of February, she sent an SMS apologizing for the last-minute invite to the opening of "You Have Every Right" at the Ateneo Art Gallery.  I was on my way to an officially sanctioned project (therefore, I really had to put on decent clothes and get out of the house): to interview a couple in BF Parañaque. Kiri didn't gauge the distances I had to cross to be at her affair, but I got the interview down pat to a little over two hours and arrived at the Ateneo with my bladder ready to burst.

I spotted Lyra Garcellano who led me up to the exhibit area, she pointing out the performance going on. Before I could turn to thank her, she was gone. Hmmm, I must tell her mom her little Lyrly has ninja-like reflexes.

I was more curious about what was on the walls than what the performers in blue were doing. When I turned to an alcove, what and who should I see? Drawings, a mural, painter Danny Dalena and his devoted Nini Gaviola. Upon seeing Danny's look (notably the glasses to match his all-black beatnik getup), I couldn't help asking, in my usual tactless fashion that could be socially embarrassing if my spouse had been with me, "Baldado ka na (referring to his cane), bulag pa? John Lennon look ba 'yan?" Good thing I wasn't speaking into his good ear, and I was rewarded with one of his tight, reassuring hugs. Kiri right away took the digicam from my hand and took the following shots.

Nini, Danny and Granny B

The signs behind us, made by Maria Cruz, are bits of dialogue from a Celso Ad. Castillo movie. Here I am giggling and about to burst out laughing when  Danny puckers his lips and insists on my doing the same. I can only hold his hand.

With my bag, umbrella and white hat, I can pass for the governess of Danny's children and grandchildren. That's us closing a deal that henceforth I will ensure that his girls must be kept out of harm's way.

On a more serious note, the show includes these other women artists, apart from Kiri and Maria, who're described by the Gallery as having a "post-feminist edge": Lizza May David, Tracey Moffatt, Claudia Del Fierro, Annika Eriksson, Lilibeth Cuenca Rasmussen. Their works were described as revealing "certain biographies that become a preface to social change as the personal becomes political." The show's up till April 20.

 
Photos by Kiri Dalena

Taxonomy by Lyra with Jef

Check out this exhibit: "Taxonomy" by LYRA GARCELLANO with Jef Carnay
Up at Silverlens, Manila until Nov. 24, 2012

Silverlens is at  2/F YMC Building 2, 2320 Don Chino Roces Extension, Makati City, with gallery hours Mon-Fri 10am-7pm, Sat 1-6pm. Email: manage@silverlensgalleries.com

Missing the Cold

I never thought I would get homesick for the cold, but I am during this blistering time in Metro Manila where announcements of power outages make you grind your teeth and cause cancellations of any plans for the day.

I just reviewed the photos my children took of our East Coast sortie in the fall of 2009 right before the heavy blizzards and snowstorms came in, and I thought what I’d give for a hint of a breeze or the swish of wind that comes from what they call the canyon effect when you’re standing on a street corner surrounded by skyscrapers and this wind from nowhere lashes at you and sends you scurrying indoors.

Ella Fitzgerald has a beautiful song “Autumn in New York” extolling the colors of fall and the canyons of steel. I love it. I played it in my imaginary soundtrack as my daughter Kimi and I wandered in Central Park as we stepped out of the Guggenheim Museum one noon after viewing the Kandinsky retrospective. We walked alongside the rails of the Jacqueline K. Onassis reservoir and watched squirrels running up and down trees. I never got to Bow Bridge which is immortalized in several movies as my legs began to get numb. At some point, we walked to the nearest bus stop, got into one that brought us to the New York Public Library where I found reassuring warmth again.

My young friend Lyra Garcellano, who’s on an Asian Artists Council grant in NYC, dislikes the slush of winter (no hint of spring as of yesterday, she said as we chatted online), but she’ll take winter cold anytime, too, after I described how tormenting this drought-aggravated, early Philippine summer is.

Here Kimi the photographer and Ida catch me buttoning up in a heavy-duty jacket at the Rockefeller Plaza.