Plet's Le Boudoir Rouge Love Seat and Emong's Escape Artist
When the Earth Smelled of Water is husband and wife team Emong Borlongan and Plet Bolipata's latest show at the Alliance Francaise de Manille. The two have been married for the last twenty years and hied off in Zambales where they actually met.
Most of Emong's artworks depict life in the fishing village of San Antonio while Plet's works are totally new. Well, I haven't seen these seats before. They are functional sculpture sofa pieces made out of resin, crochet, steel and even broken glass.
Note that she used the same mold for her ongoing show at Bonifacio Global City's offsite gallery called imagiNATION. It is an outdoor installation featuring 7 to 12-foot animal sculptures.
Emong's Dynamite Kid
Here's what Rene Guatio wrote about the couple's latest project:
Based in San Antonio, Zambales, in a seaside mango orchard and art center, the artist couple Elmer Borlongan and Plet Bolipata bring their visions of creation, their celebrations of life to the city: colorful canvases imbued with the refreshing and life-giving blessings of the sea and water, resin vessels that allude to the ark, and the great deluge that drowned the earth, so that life may be renewed.
Emong's Melancholia
Emong highlights various scenes - a 'chicken fight' in the water, a child drawing water from a well, fishermen with their nets, an escape artist in a water container, a woman wading into the ocean, a scene of melancholy in a bath tub - each an allusion to water and the sea, reflecting the artist's signature humor, wit, and deep understanding of the human character. He says: "We are drawn to water because we live close to the sea."
Plet's Le Taxi Sofa
Plet always injects a fresh and playful sensibility to her art, which includes oils, collages, naif figures, and lately, colorful mosaics of animals. Her metal and tile mosaics of zoo animals about to be installed at Global City are complemented by the resin sofas in this show that were inspired by Holly Golightly's bathtub sofa from Breakfast at Tiffany's.
The sofas represent vessels that save us from the deluge, their colors reminding us of the rainbow that symbolizes God's promise, and our hope. She hopes that people "can relax as the stresses and strains of their daily lives subside, and take the time to enjoy and appreciate the preciousness of life."
Bravo Plet and Emong! The show will run until May 3, 2012.
With artist Plet setaing on her Le Peacock Sofa
Here's some shots of Plet's gigantic steel animal sculptures at the offsite gallery in Bonifacio Global City, 26th Street corner 7th Ave:
Incredible! The winners of the 30-day Paleo Challenge indeed S H R U N K. Here's Team 26's pre- (flubby) and post- (stud) shots:
Based on the March 15 scoreboard, I placed my bet on Team 5 and alas, they came in second place. My partner Mel and I didn't make it to the top ten but we did lose weight. I dropped down from 54 to 51 kilos in the last week. Mind you though, not because of the challenge but I managed to mangle my pinky toe and thus, lost 3 kilos from not working out! LOL! Meantime, my partner Mel was drop dead gorgeous on her wedding day and that for me is the greatest outcome of this Challenge!
Congratulations to the winners and particpants. I'll definitely sign up in the next Challenge where this time, the odds will be in my favor.
Birthday celebrant Pinky with Pi and Camille behind
I just spent the weekend in Bahay Kalipay (BK) in Puerto Princesa, Palawan to celebrate Pinky's birthday detoxing (diet consisted of all raw food and coconuts) and doing some inner dance.
BK-owner, Maia EarthVillage-founder and inner dance lead Pi Villaraza was busy preparing for the Maian Planet 2012 Festival, a gathering of inner dance practitioners from all over the world. He's expecting over 50 participants. I met the ladies from Hawaii - Petronella (who gave us a traditional Lomi massage), her sister, Amaya and raw food expert Elle; Americans Mary and Shannon; the Brits UFC fighter Tom, DJ Vicky; Singaporeans, French and Filipinos. There are more coming before the festival begins on March 21.
Maia Earth Village in Palawan
I asked him if he timed the event during the March 22 warning and he said that March 21 is the date of the spring equinox when the day is equal to night. The word is derived from the Latin aequus (equal) and nox (night). Also, the date falls on a new moon.
The festival's venue is in the Maia Earth Village, the first intentional community in the Philippines. It is now mushrooming with almost built structures - a yoga shala, a healing space, an indigo school and an inner dance center. The last time I was there, the main building (left) photo was under construction.
Quoting from his post, the festival's venue is "within Maia Conscious Community grounds, an eco-village that rests on the principles of inner dance process. Maia is not a geographical place on earth, it is rather an ongoing visioning of applying inner dance ascension principles to practical life." He said that the purpose of the gathering is for the practitioners to interact with othr cultures and "experience each other with heightened inner dance, inner languge, inner world and conscious community levels."
Pi welcoming the Singaporeans (who are not in the photo)
Pinky helping UFC fighter Tom
Camille, Ellie and Shannon (who's happy her tumor's gone after 10-days on raw food)
After this weekend's experience, it is quite uncanny that I chanced upon this video uploaded in November 2010 of Keisha Crowther, a Shaman referred to as the Little Grandmother who prophesied to expect a pole shift in 2012 (well, this year) and to prepare ourselves. She said that
"we literally have two years to change the way we are... That which you give your energy or emotion to becomes your reality.. In the next couple of years, many things are going to change... if you stay in your heart and are excited for what is coming then you will live in joy.. If we do not change and stay in the mind and ego, we will be removed. All we are asked to do is be love."
"You've been warned!" That's what a friend told me last Friday regarding322or March 22, 2012. He said to make sure that I have enough water and food on this day. Somewhat alarmed, I tweeted and asked for the significance of the date and two astrologers replied:
I checked google and found this video:
9Nania who uploaded the video on January 11, 2012 said that "the likelihood that there will be another megaquake and axis shift on March 22, 2012 is very high. The cause of these shifts is a massive celestial object moving inward from the 9 o'clock orientation of the solar system/springtime/constellations Leo-Orion."
The theory of the megaquake is based on the 188 day cycle starting from the earthquake in Chile:
1. February 27, 2010 - earth's axis shifted 3 inches, 8.8 earthquake in Chile
2. September 3, 2010 - 7.0 earthquake in New Zealand (recorded 188 days after)
3. March 11, 2011 - earth's axis shifted 4-10 inches, 9.0 earthquake in Japan (189 days after)
4. September 15, 2011 - 7.3 earthquake in Fiji (188 days after)
And here's another video uploaded by Terral03 on January 25, 2012. This time, specifying the time @ 4:58:34 UTC, intensity 9+ magnitude quake and the location in the Pacific Ring of Fire. Terral03 in his video called it the Illuminati day and qualified that this is not the end of the world. He said that there's a high probability that it may occur anywhere along the diagonal between New Zealand and Alaska.
Alright, I've done some research and considering that three earthquakes happened in the last two months - 6.8-magnitude in Negros (Feb 6), 5.2 in Masbate (March 6) and 5.3 in Mindoro (March 9), I might as well heed the advise of my friend to take stock of food and water. I am sharing this not to alarm you but just to prepare. Be safe!
