eight paintings. four archetypes. one burgundy ground.

Loob [loh-ohb] is a Tagalog word with no clean English translation. It means the inner self— the space inside the body that holds everything you’ve ever felt but never said out loud.

This series paints four Filipino feminine archetypes—the Ate, the Ina, the Nanay, the Bunso—each shown twice. Once in performance. Once in softening.

The women in these paintings are Filipino. But the wound is older than any one culture. The strength performed until it fused with skin. The love given through action because tenderness was never modelled. The silence passed down so carefully, so completely, that the daughters mistook it for their own personality.

You may not have a Tagalog word for what you carry. But you have carried it.

Eight paintings. Currently in progress.