feed our thirst & fill us up with heART

On a recent lakwatcha adventure to Iloilo wonder | wander | women spent our days exploring art studios, galleries and museums. Viewing the displays and exhibits fed our thirst for wonder and filled is with insight and inspiration - enough to tide us over until another visit. 

We were missing this sorely the past year - collections of art purposely displayed to enhance its beauty so it spills over to us - its viewers and appreciative audience. 

March 2026 line up at IloMOCA

Crammed into only a few days spared, all the visual overload and creative overstimulation overcame us in a fevered frenzy. Images flying by our flickering lids left us gasping and breathless. Filling our senses to overflowing - our proverbial cups running over in generous waves of delight and awe. 

Of all the wonders we got to experience face to face and in close quarters, we loved most the indigenous weaves and the contemporary embroidery of stories told - ancient and ageless. Most especially with the empowered strength of our female ancestors - our earthly and spiritual sisterhood of imagery and inspiration. 

SUPER Bayi Power Look

In the symbols and textures of fabrics - rich patterns paraded proudly across space and time - reaching from past, to present, to future. Stirring memories and emotions with their silent siren songs. No words necessary or imaginable could capture what was long buried or lost. 

Cultures, lives and languages gone forever. Did you know that every three months on average a language - an irreplaceable key to understanding the world - fades away. Prisms through which we look at the world - a shared understanding that binds a people together. 

Atypography as an art movement

A diversity of languages encourages a diversity of thought, of perspectives, of sense-making. Every language tells us a little bit about who we are. When a language dies, a sliver of our shared culture vanishes, and humanity is poorer for the loss. 

Studies predict by the end of the century as much as ninety percent of the world’s 6,500 languages will be gone forever. What does it mean to lose a language? Deep knowledge, passed down over millennia - gone, erased, wiped out. 

"Mothers as/are Teachers" by Marika Constantino

Along with all the ways of thinking about the land, the sea, the sky, and the flora and fauna that inhabit them. Rituals and recipes, myths and memories, cultures and ceremonies. 

For the speakers of these lost languages, it means losing a part of themselves - deprived of a well of wisdom and distanced from the way of life their words kept alive. The alphabet prevents a people from being lost. 

Enacted Embodiment 2. 3. 4

At IloMOCA we entered the hulot room to view contemporary pieces of local female art. An exhibit to celebrate all women and girls this month of March. We were immediately drawn to the Enacted Embodiment series. 

The embroidered font features passages from various essays on education penned decades ago by artist Marika Constantino's grandmother, Dada Ming (Letizia Roxas Constantino). These extracts remain relevant to this day, serving as guiding posts through life, to be passed on to the next generation. 

SUPER Bayi color & dress kits at IloMOCA