'Sarap ng Buhay'

Cerda’s concepts of children make for self-identification among the young ones, and a nostalgia trip among the young once.

Fleeting are children’s emotional states by reason of age, environment, progeny, and so on. Their attention spans are short. And changeable. To ask for the genesis of such states is to enter into a world that is culture-bound. Leave that to the behavioral scientists.

Toti Cerda, through his 52 original watercolors and acrylics that constitute the body of his major exhibition titled “Forever Young,” prove that one does not have to have an academic degree in psychology or any other behavioral science, to be able to observe, in fact “read” the emotional states of children. (SM Megamall, Mandaluyong City, Aug. 21-Sept. 6. Presented by Gallery Genesis). What he did was to observe children in various environments: in open spaces and drenched under a heavy downpour or a spurting water tank; being what they are, namely cantankerous in tree crowns; biting a hanging common fruit; on sidewalks oblivious of the outside world; defying Newton’s law of gravity with their breath-taking games; doing their artistic “masterpieces” on pavements; lost to themselves in a maze of opportunities and possibilities through improvised print ads; putting on jeans too large for their sizes, etc.

Such scenes peopled by children who are not into the well-heeled born, are lost in our present society for various reasons. And for having focused his eye, heart, and head on them, Cerda now rises above the throng.

Cerda’s readings of children’s behavioral states are clear and cut across all kinds of socio-economic levels of and divisions. The children are innocence and carefree abandon come to living color. His concepts of children make for self-identification among the young ones, and a nostalgia trip among the young once.

Rollicking in the rain, as only children can do best, is both a release of negative behavioral states, as well as a reception of a refreshing blessing that washes away inhibition. Cerda captured these states with mouths agape complete with a generous display of gums, eyes transformed into slits, and other bodily movements that at times suggest paroxysmal delight. And where children are in groups, the boys and girls—all at prepuberty age—intimate no malice as their wet clothes cling to their bodies. The children are shown candidly and are in various stages of mirth and abandon.

Cerda had some photo references in some children in the rain and in other scenes of children’s worlds, but he rearranged them, changed the backgrounds to focus on the children.

Impatience is also embedded in Cerda’s concepts of children. A child may try on a pair of jeans several times larger than his size. To the young ones, this is impatience to grow old that words can hardly articulate from their ends. Cerda’s reading of this impatience continues, as the rightward direction of the child parallels the way we read and write, i.e., from left to right.

Conversely, to the young once, this is intrusion into their self-assessed “mature” domains. Obviously, they cannot understand this impatience of the young ones.

Cerda who took up draftsmanship at the Technological University of the Philippines, and a former komiks illustrator in the footsteps of Francisco V. Coching, did the professional behavioral scientists one better—in visual language.

Apart from their surrounding environments in parts, the children are hyper-realists, with an added virtue: they are conceived and actualized with clearly-controlled color specks that produce volume and strength, particularly in the arms. This is a technical virtuosity.

Innocence is brought over to the children’s playthings which are remnants of warfare. Clearly, the world created and ruled by the old folks is beyond the ken of the children as yet. But make no mistake about this. Children enjoy the products of ingenuity.

This kind of reading counts among the reasons why Cerda’s one-man show is called “Forever Young.”

The internet which has intruded peoples’ private and public lives, has also “intruded” Cerda’s works in the form of respective titles and imaginary websites. Hyper-realism mingling with today’s neticized world spells every work’s contemporariness and classic mold simply because the anatomy of human beings will remain as it is. Forever.

On the technical side, watercolor is a tough and challenging medium. A mistake is a mistake. It cannot be painted over without uglifying the whole painting. Unlike oil where an unwanted hue can be covered with sand or thick pigment for texture, watercolor is a jealous medium. Its character must preface the work’s content, otherwise the finished product degenerates into an insignificant study.

Cerda who taught himself how to paint, and is now a Hall of Famer in the Kulay sa Tubig, the most prestigious watercolor competition and exhibition which Gallery Genesis initiated more than a quarter of a century ago, was able to study the nature of the medium. Moreover, he succeeded in making it submit to his demanding commands.

Cerda is now on his way to becoming one of the country’s master watercolorists.