“Setting a table asks soul to be present as we transform eating into dining. Plates and cups and silverware may be objects of family memory or simply beautiful tools of the table. A tablecloth, cloth napkins, candles, and even a trivet can change an ordinary meal into an experience that magically holds a family together, invites needed conversation, stokes friendship, and swells the soul with the ordinary pleasures it craves.” Thus wrote Thomas Moore, in his book The Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life.

     In Gerardo Jimenez’s second solo exhibition titled Tablescapes at the Prism Gallery, the artist’s works indeed swell with the ordinary pleasures it craves. On view are his many watercolours depicting the various table presentations of Gejo – for that is the sobriquet that he is known by his friends, among which count some of the country’s celebrated homemakers, hosts, chefs, artists , writers and storytellers such as Margarita Fores, Happy Ongpauco, An Mercado Alcantara, Lizette Barreto Gueco, Aleth Ocampo, Maritess V. Joaquin, Joel
Binamira, Dedet dela Fuente, and Pio Goco of the Goco Family of Taal, Batangas. No stone – or rather, spoon or fork, or Sterling and Limoges china – has been left unturned, for such is the evident joy and delight that have been brought to bear on their arrangement. One imagines that in their creative hands even a banana leaf serving as a plate can be just as aesthetically satisfying. The thrills of the eyes and the tastebuds fairly match each other, a balancing act of whimsy and discipline. The renowned writer Gilda Cordero-Fernando was known to have a penchant for the unmatched tableware, but such is her elan and insouciance that everything she does as a hostess is marked by confidence, humor, and flourish, and therefore, stylish.

Nourishment and Delectation

     Here, indeed, arranged on a table, are the pleasures of living and the conviviality of friendship. From one artistry to another, we behold a visual and vicariously partake of these sumptuous still lifes, celebrating images that are evocative of nourishment and delectation – not only for the eyes, the body, but also for the soul. For certainly, we eat not only with our mouths – but with our eyes. A well-laid out table, orchestrated with symmetry and colors and the contrasting textures of glasses and goblets, plates and cutlery, and plain or patterned tablecloth, cannot but whet one’s appetite, bracing us for the experience ahead.

Instagram-able?

     There is a word that is often bandied about: “Instagram-able.”  Being current and “in,” it sounds rather chi-chi, though one laments, indeed cringes at the suggestion that the image at hand, pretty and charming it may be, had been wrought merely and conveniently for aesthetic satiety, only to be disposed of as speedily and greedily as one had clicked the cell phone button.

     So: are Gejo’s watercolors “Instagram-able”? Perish the thought.  One rather relishes the thought that these watercolours were meant to be savored slowly, the better to sustain their spirit of enchantment. Those of us – as if there were any exceptions – who have, at one time or another, gone to, and eaten at a fast-food joint, would be in a better mood and disposition to appreciate Gejo’s works. For the human spirit, too, can be starved.

Transparency and Limpidity

     Watercolor in fact is the ideal medium for this experience, as the medium has the unique qualities of transparency and limpidity not granted oils, or even that other water-based medium, acrylic. Thus the medium can evoke memories and remembrances, an intimacy with the moment, and can thus lift us from the physical place of a dining room into more ethereal regions. Thus, whether the tablescape is situated in some elegant dining room in a Makati mansion or a premium condo, or in an ancient bahay na bato in the province, a common attribute pervades the scene: an intensification of awareness of time, a solacing silence before the arrival of guests, and a sensation of a wondrous time coming ahead with friends. In contrast, one thinks of many French Impressionist painters, notably Bonnard, whose tablescapes depict the scene after the departure of the guests, with the table in domestic disarray. While that may have its own unpretentious charm, one rather favors Gejo’s artistic ritual preparation, an act that suggests the gentrification of the spirit.

Subtlety of Colors

      It is a commonplace to say that colors can by turns convey and alter specific moods. These tablescapes are no exception. These were generally in delicate pastel hues – colors that are comfortable in their genial interiority, not seeking attention the way hot primary colors do shying away from turbulent and restless brushstrokes. In these works, it is the overall quiet ambience that is paramount, not centered on an artist’s exhibitionist technical skills, and with no anxious effort to solicit applause. Gejo realizes that the quality or temper of an artist’s brushstrokes should be attuned, not incongruent, with the purpose of the painting: a reflection of the Good Life, a celebration of friendship.

     As the French cookery writer Eduard de Pomiane exalted a lunch that he has prepared for his friends:
     And now there is a succession of joys:
      The eggs with a glass of cider – just like velvet.
      The roast with its gravy, and the mushrooms that I warmed whilst I was dishing up the roast – a rustic cooking with a primituive freshness.
With this, a glass of Burgundy.
     The peas follow, soothingly bland.
      The cheese…The strawberries and cream…The coffee…A thimbleful of plum brandy…
     Contentment…The joy of living and of loving one’s friends.
     Or: as Gerard “Gejo” Jimenez, inviting us to his feast of watercolors, might salute us: Bon Appetit!

***************************************

Cid Reyes is the author of choice of National Artists Arturo Luz, BenCab, J. Elizalde, Navarro, and Napoleon V. Abueva. A prolific critic, he has authored over 40 art books and numerous art reviews and exhibition notes. He wrote the landmark book of interviews, “Conversations on Philippine Art.” Reyes received a “Best in Art Criticism Award” from the Art Association of the Philippines (AAP)