Taliwala

Jessa Balag has long painted from places close to home. The daughter of a baker and a homemaker, she first became known for works shaped by bread. Objects tied to labor and nourishment appeared throughout her paintings and installations as markers of everyday survival and intimacy. In Taliwala, her exhibition of recent works, the artist continues this sensitivity toward ordinary objects by turning her attention to the humble brown paper bag. It may be cheap, disposable, and often unnoticed, but for her, it is deeply tied to memory and upbringing. This supot is used to hold piping hot pandesal fresh from the oven, its surface absorbing warmth, oil, and the scent of bread in early mornings. It is also used for takeout food, packed lunches, baon, and pasalubong. Moving quietly through daily life, it becomes more than simple packaging. It becomes a symbol of caregiving, nourishment, and the quiet labor of preparing something for another person. It passes from hand to hand without ceremony, yet it carries traces of affection and thoughtfulness.

Taliwala is a Cebuano word that refers to being in the middle, the space between departure and arrival. Balag began production for the exhibition by asking herself a simple question: why do people travel, and where are we all going? Behind every trip is a reason that cannot always be seen. Some travel to work, to provide. Some leave home carrying food, gifts, or necessities for others. In these works, travel is shown as an act tied closely to responsibility, love, devotion, and hope. And that special package you carry from one point to another.

The paper bag becomes a vessel for these unseen motivations. Its contents are often hidden, but what it represents feels deeply familiar. In one work on canvas, a man clutches a large paper bag that contains fragments of memory and domestic life in well-loved picture frames. In another, multiple bags hover above a young figure like thoughts or a rainshower of takeout food suspended in midair. One bag frames a boy’s animated face as he finds a treasure probably previously wrapped as a surprise. The ordinary object becomes psychological and symbolic without losing its connection to real life.

The exhibition also includes ten painted and sculptural paper bags constructed with epoxy, each functioning as its own container of narrative. Wrinkled surfaces, folded edges, and worn textures are rendered with care, allowing the bags to feel almost soft. Balag paints figures on the brown ground, each face layered with a slice of everyday ephemera: calendars, paper bills, IDs, serving as markers of mundanity. A red ribbon is also part of the artist's imagery, suggesting an unseen bond between people separated by distance and circumstance. Even in moments of isolation, the works imply that people remain tied to one another.

In Taliwala, that artist refuses to separate the poetic from the ordinary, finding meaning not in grand gestures, but in the small acts people repeat daily for family, friends, and loved ones. As she continues her creative journey, Balag expands her visual language while remaining rooted in the same concerns that have always shaped her practice. She paints the quiet architecture of care, and the ways ordinary objects become witnesses to human connection. The middle space of travel, that in-between of comings and goings, becomes a space of longing, labor, and tenderness.