"ASA ATO" "MAO BA" "LAGEH"

This piece is drawn from the market mornings I grew up watching. "Asa ato," "Mao ba," "Lageh," Cebuano for "which one," "really," "indeed," captures a snippet of the easy, teasing banter between three livestock and poultry sellers waiting out the heat under a roadside tree. Two women and a man sit on upturned pails and drums, motorcycles and market baskets behind them, while four pigs and three native chickens lie tied and drowsing at their feet. Painted in realism with close attention to light filtering through leaves onto skin and dust, the work sits at the crossing of genre painting and Philippine provincial life, the kind of quiet, human scene that rarely gets this much care. This artwork would suit a collection built around Visayan folk life, or sit well among other contemporary Filipino realist works documenting everyday life in the Philippines. This piece is rendered in acrylic on canvas, measuring 122 x 91 cm, completed in 2026. It is signed, unframed and comes with a certificate of authenticity.