?OMELETTE: PAINTED OSTRICH Eggs? is the artistic result of a chance encounter with an egg.

At a time when most art shouts out its size, Lilianna Manahan?s delicately complex method of painting, etching and gilding on a small curved surface whispers.

?Omelette,? featuring a dozen painted ostrich eggs, recently opened in 20 Square, Silverlens Gallery, Pasong Tamo Extension, Makati.

But these are no modern-day Easter eggs in bright pastel colors.

These are ostrich eggs to begin with: primed with gesso, drawn and painted using watercolor and gold leaf.

The process is not simple, though it may risk looking so because of its playful fluidity. Her imagery is based on characters and scenarios, imagined or true-to-life, that outline the paths of her thoughts and selected memories.

Translating these onto concave and convex surfaces would mean a facility with drafting and the use of foreshortening to give the illusion of depth. Cleverly installed on top of four-foot columns, they create a space within a space, while keeping the viewer close to the eggs without the knowledge of their wider reach into place and time.

I admire the easy grace and whimsy of Lilianna?s painted ostrich eggs. They evoke a sort of Alice-in-Wonderland feeling. I become smaller and enter a fascinating repository of tales and stories, recollections of being read to as a child and eventually reading to my own children. It is a world where ?nonsense makes sense,? where ?Horton Hears a Who? and where Maurice Sendak?s Wild Things are.

Some of the eggs are like delicately complex stage sets, copiously painted; showing animated objects, plants, animals, a hall of arched entryways leading to a vanishing point.

?My Slumberland? shows two flamingos on a checkerboard in a space that looks like a room in the Hermitage.

?Cliffhangers? reminds me of ?Gulliver?s Travels? and Dr. Doolittle?s menagerie. The details are delightful and the gold-leaf gilding and ornamental finial give it an imperial touch.

Manahan is an industrial designer whose trained eye for color and detail zoomed in on an empty ostrich egg and saw in there a chance to let her knowledge of scale and 3D modeling run free in a playful way.

Throughout her formative years, she was also steeped in a world of books, color, art history and an environment of playful exuberance. Home was an artistic hothouse where self-expression, imagination and creativity were casually encouraged.

?Omelette? embodies the spirit of Rococo in a new and youthful way with a very popular feel to it. Few professions require such a diversity of skills and talent, and we are happy that Manahan uses it all.