Aruga (Care): In Bloom — What We Carry, What We Grow
A Mother’s Day collaboration and conversation with Filipina artist and community organizer nelli v. agbulos
We explore the quiet labour of love and care — practiced by us, the women in our family, and the Filipina coffee farmers we call friends. Plus, at the very end, we share how you can keep this artwork as a limited-edition tote bag!
Aruga: In Bloom Tote bag illustration by nelli v. agbulos (@agbulosart)
On The Season & People That Inspired Aruga: In Bloom
Iona: ‘Aruga’ means 'care' in Filipino but signifies something much deeper. It encompasses nurturing, tending, holding, and protecting, often in a way that's often quiet and unspoken.
Can you tell us more about the inspiration behind Aruga: In Bloom? What were you feeling or moving through when you started creating this piece? Were there specific people, memories, or moments that shaped this work?
nelli: This piece is inspired by the coffee bean flower, my practice of giving flowers, and the female farm workers behind kapé.
I wanted to feature the women who care for the land that the coffee beans grow on. They are caretakers of the land and the main pillar of support for their families. Within the petals are different acts of love — women looking after seedlings, touching the soil to ensure proper germination, inspecting the coffee plant, and carrying the beans to storage after harvest. In the centre of the flower is a female figure hugging a child. The stem of the flower has red coffee cherries. Below the head of the flower are 3 children looking up at the women above them.
Flowers are the perfect symbol for life/death. When you reached out to me, I wanted this artwork to symbolize the particular moment in our lives that brought us together.
In the past year, both of us had gone through major deaths in our families that somehow (miraculously) have helped us become stronger.
Life moved with us, despite the heavy emotional weight that comes with grief.
Before last year I was never a flower person, but I’ve come to appreciate them because one of my Titas (who passed away April 2025) was fond of them. She often spoke to me about the “stories within the petals / what flowers would tell us if they could speak / true love is knowing the core of someone which is like removing the petals of a rose”. I laughed at her every time she said that.
My Tita had a very close connection to the land she grew up on, and she loved her city plants fiercely. Now that she’s gone, I think what she meant is that the depths of loving someone/our people will be one of the hardest lessons we’ll ever learn. But the accompanying pain and challenges are worth it because it changes us.
It’s easy to spot the physical labour that women do, but there is so much invisibilized emotional care that goes unrecognized in the workplace and in raising families. This piece is an ode to the female workers who show love in their everyday actions and fight relentlessly for the future that their children deserve.
I placed the children at the bottom of the flower not just because they’re looking up at the female caretakers (mother, tita, lola, ate — however you want to interpret it), but because they’re looking up at the sky and all the possibilities it holds.
The faces of the children could be facing down, but instead, they’re facing up because of the resolute strength and faith that their mothers/female caretakers have instilled in them.
Particularly for this illustration, I thought about how the female farm workers behind Kapé are building and caring for something that nourishes people everyday. There is so much strength that can be drawn from their perseverance.
I started documenting my months through song playlists; these are the songs I had on repeat while I made Aruga:
Altar – Kehlani
Feast of Abscession – Ozawar
Extinction – Ozawar
Smile – Scarface ft. 2Pac
Savior – Lights
I’m Like A Bird – Nelly Furtado
Hope – NF
So I – Charli XCX
Antes Que Se Acabe – Bad Bunny
Someone’s Watching Over Me – Hilary Duff
I Love You Always Forever – Donna Lewis
I invite you all to listen to my playlist on Spotify.
Iona: What struck me as you shared this was how much of this piece holds both life and loss at the same time. The idea that flowers can carry memory, grief, and love—it just feels so deeply personal, but also something many of us understand in our own way.
Similarly, music can also carry many feelings. My playlist is an eclectic mix from classics to Original Pinoy Music (OPM) to indie to family folk music that my toddler loves listening to:
Mabuhay – Mishka Adams
Everywhere – Fleetwood Mac
Time after Time – Cyndi Lauper
With a Smile – Eraserheads
Suliranin – IV of Spades
When I Met You – Apo Hiking Society
I’ll be Your Mirror – The Velvet Underground & Nico
La Valse d’Amelie (Version Orchestre) - Yann Tiersen
Our House – Joni Mitchell & Graham Nash
Both Sides Now – Joni Mitchell
I Know the End – Phoebe Bridgers
Letting Go – Angie McMahon
Never Been Better – Ben Abraham
1901 – Phoenix
Thanks a Lot – Raffi
Glimmer – Oh Clementine
On The Way Filipinos Carry The Labour of Care
Iona: In this season of motherhood, I’ve been thinking a lot about the labour of care — the visible and invisible ways we hold others, often without pause. And at the same time, I’m still learning how to hold my own grief and what it means to continue showing up fully. All whilst still being reminded to practice the grace and gentleness that I would have easily given others, but think twice about giving to myself.
When I look at this artwork, I see so much of that layered care. I’m curious, how do you see it?
nelli: Society wouldn’t exist without female labour, especially the levels and layers of care that women practice every day. Undeniably, women hold up half the sky.
Iona: Wow. ‘Women hold up half the sky.’ That will stay with me.
Care lives not just in big gestures, but in the everyday, the mundane, the repetitive, the unseen, the enduring. Holding and comforting a crying child, silly play and storytime, the daily cooking, laundry-folding, and dishwashing. Often those most unglamorous things mean so much.
I am curious, how does your cultural identity and activism influence your creative process?
nelli: We Filipinos have a rich history of our people struggling for our rights and collective liberation.
I sometimes feel awkward telling people I’m a full-time organizer because with each instance I grapple with my own childhood and upbringing, and to put it simply — I organize because I don’t want children growing up with the persistent inequities in our society.
I can’t be a good organizer if I don’t allow myself to accept the pain that comes with understanding the sacrifices our family members made to leave our homeland and to deal with the physical and emotional separation. Making art helps me process the material conditions in which other Filipinos and I grew up, and the histories of grassroots movements.
My art practice isn’t separate from my everyday life. So many stories have been written with lessons for us; it’s on us to study the past, analyze how it applies to the present, and forge ahead with a plan that involves others.
My creative process is the same – for me to fully understand the purpose of a piece, it needs to be done with others. Making art is one of my preferred outlets to muse out loud and act upon the legacy I want to leave behind. My favourite Filipino artists are the ones who make art on marginalized Filipino masses who have the most will to fight.
On Making Coffee & Art As An Act Of Care & Connection
Iona: I really resonate with what you shared about art not being separate from everyday life. That it’s something lived, studied, and shaped in community.
How do you see art and coffee intersecting in creating spaces of care and connection?
nelli: It’s all in the process of creation. Preparing coffee and making art forces individuals to slow down and make rituals beyond the day-to-day mundanities.
Coffee fuels someone to get through their day, while art can be a harbinger of metamorphosis/destruction. “Metamorphosis” because art requires reflection, which can lead to new thoughts and ideas. “Destruction” because ideas from the past inspire the present and future.
Combined, metamorphosis and destruction guarantee someone’s inevitable transformation.
Making art forces ideas to lead to some type of action. This act causes us to shed layers of vulnerability that shouldn’t be handled alone. Building spaces of care and connection isn’t an individual action – it means thinking outside of yourself to pull people in, which is only possible with deep reflection.
It’s hard to open up to people and share the hidden aspects of yourself, but that’s part of the process of making art. The connection within yourself is deepened, along with the connection(s) you have with others you choose to let in.
I’m not the same person I was at the beginning of my morning coffee routine and art practice because these rituals are moments when I think about selfless love, self-love, how to heal, and grace.
Iona: There’s something about ritual—whether it’s making coffee or creating—that invites us to slow down; to feel grounded in the present moment and to remember we’re not meant to carry things alone.
These moments of mindfulness can make it clear to us what really matters. What are you looking forward to in this next season?
nelli: There are 4 that come to mind, in no particular order…
Kerima. Witnessing my goddaughter and her parents make a life on their own terms. When this is published, my goddaughter Kerima will be 5 months old. I can’t wait to read books to her about liberation struggles from the Philippines to Vietnam, and show her art pieces made by the Black Panthers and Palestinian youth.
Failing in the kitchen. Continue to exchange cooking and baking experiments with my mom (a baker). Recently, I made a miso guajillo butter linguine too spicy, and she still ate it.
Boxing. I took a hiatus from it because of a minor concussion in March.
Building the society we deserve. Continue to organize with Filipinos here to put in 10% more in acting upon the belief that a new world is possible. Everyday I learn something new from the Filipino youth here, and I am inspired by them. They are culturally wiser than me.
Iona: If you could offer one gentle message to someone encountering this piece for the first time, what would it be?
nelli: Stop and smell the flowers. Buy yourself and a loved one flowers. Whenever you fall into a jaded panic, think about how a flower grows.
There’s something powerful about witnessing care in its many forms. Not just as something we give, but something we are shaped by.
This piece reminds me that care doesn’t always announce itself. Sometimes, it looks like tending, staying, choosing to believe in what can still grow.
Aruga: In Bloom is about legacy, the kind that is carried in hands, in memory, in everyday acts of love.
Maraming salamat, nelli, for creating something that invites us to pause, reflect, and return to what matters.
If you’d like to carry or gift this piece of homegrown art for Mother’s Day, pre-orders are now open for a limited-edition tote bag featuring Aruga: In Bloom.
About the Artist: nelli v. agbulos
nelli v. agbulos is a second-generation Filipino based in so-called vancouver, b.c. She is a full-time community organizer and self-taught artist who believes art should be used to tell the truth and combat apathy and despair.
Lover of Sharpies, abandoned sketchbooks, and fountain pens. With her inspiration rooted in an obsession with black and white photography, Picasso, and dried flowers, nelli’s hand-drawn ink illustrations are one way she lets herself dream about the world we need to build.
nelli’s art has been recognized by Vancouver Chinatown and international press. Alongside her artistic practice, she works closely with Filipino youth and their families to emphasize the importance of convening across organizations and sectors to understand current events and the constant warmongering. | Instagram: @agbulosart