Art and restaurants; generally people do not associate these two things together. Can this concept bring more than a simple restaurant experience and make it better?

This is something that a group of Artists are trying to prove and develop through the Plates and Palettes project, which is now in its successful second season.

Plates and Palettes is bringing the spirit of Paris - Saint Denis into Abuja, with the strong force of African culture behind the colours and themes in the paintings exhibited by three artists.

All of the artists are well known, and most of them have even had international exhibition experience. Madam Addis Okoli, Mr Micheal Ikoyi and Mr Chike Emembo are proving their concept right through graceful execution. They are making a coupage between art and restaurants and, as in real wine coupage, they produce sophisticated and pleasant and colourful profiles.

The authors themselves said at the opening ceremony:" The relationship between food and art stretches back more than 30,000 years, when paintings of wild edible animals are crafted on cave walls. This relationship has evolved considerably since then."

We must agree it has evolved to a better and more fulfilling stage.

As a new trend, the combination of art and food has been recognised around the world and artists have applied that trend. Restaurants around the world are attracting patrons with their own art collections and rotating exhibitions. In Zurich, Kronenhalle's original owner, Hulda Zunsteg and her son Gustav, spent decades amassing a personal art collection, filling the restaurant with art by German and Swiss painter Paul Klee, Russian abstract painter Wassily Kadinsky, Swiss painter Ferdinand Holer and others.

As Mr. Chike Emembo said at the opening of season 2 at the Traffic Missouri in Maitama: " The aim of this project is to keep an open dialogue and maintain social consciousness. We get closer to this with relational aesthetics and social practice, which often use food to facilitate social interaction. We aim to have diners feed their eyes, body, and soul."

 This event will run across three of Abuja's finest restaurants; "Traffic/ Missouri", "805" restaurant and the "Charcoal Grill and Coffee Lounge". The first part is from 19th - 29th November at the Traffic Missouri in Maitama, the second is from 1st - 10th of December at the 805 in Wuse, and the last is 11th - 20th of December at the Charcoal Grill and Coffee Lounge, Wuse.

All in all, artists are offering unique experiences and are in fact quite different from each other.

Madam Addis Okoli polished her talent internationally at University of Southampton; she is known for a  strong brushstroke and an eternal "battle" between hot and cold colours, with distinctive African origin beauty mixed in it. She is bringing a "happy and colourful light" to African life scenes.

Mr. Chike Emembo shows a certain calmness and tension all at the same time. With the green winged seraphim's and wingless figures emerging from deep dart square-like cavities on bare bright walls. The compositions are emotionally intense while the background's white-washed walls give the viewer a lot of room to rest the eyes. Themes border on Christian faith, God and the Bible. He brings new views such as Bob Marley in role of Christ, and the "New Covenant" which is representational of as a fresh start.

Mr. Micheal Ikoyi shows multilayered paintings and colours in a glance, with intricate and complicated structures.

A powerful and mind-boggling art exhibition introducing this new concept can be found in the well-chosen locations in Abuja. You will assuredly be displaced into another realm of idea and time.

This is the "don't miss" recommendation of the Christmas season. Enjoy food and art together.

By Renio Caleta