We’re shooting at Pinto Gallery in Antipolo. Stairs of stone and cement lead to and from pockets of gardens and ponds. There is a whiff of delightful dereliction about the place, a devil-may-care attitude towards cobwebs and lichen. There are sculptures almost indistinguishable in texture from the grass and soil and wood that surround them. There is a headless, armless Amazon in stone, a man overtaken by snails, a couple in clay staring across the pool to the trees beyond. There is a chapel, with Christ floating on the wall without a cross. There are stands of bamboo, succulent leaves larger than umbrellas, and unclothed wooden saints.
Ah, I thought, a perfect place to shoot my pens.
Blessed be the Tibaldi Iride.
Frog met frog, but nothing came of their encounter.
The new Bexley sleeve filler got a taste of the limelight, in a sawn-off bamboo rod.
And a tiny tribute to the overwhelmed man in the garden.
I’d like to come back here. And sleep.
