Unpacking the Maternal Beauty

I remembered days of fragrant coconut.  My mother would sit on a cabayo and scrape a freshly split coconut out of it’s hard shell.  She would toast it in a frying pan and squeeze the oil from the fluffy shreds in a fine cloth.  She claimed the oil kept her long beautiful hair thick and black.  My aunts would tell me that my mother was the town beauty and it was her regime of calamansi to bleach her skin and coconut to keep her hair black.

I made this suitcase to represent all of those efforts of a Pinay beauty ritual and the Western, Beatles Era vibe that was my mother’s youth.

This suitcase is also displayed on the ground and encourages the viewer to change their posture and experience this piece.