Mother or Child

This painting by Geraldine Javier represents a mother’s sacrifice for a child. Here a little girl’s dress has been rendered in adult dimensions to represent the primal instinct of mothers to care for their young and to assuage their suffering. The painting is pierced with a plate on which the embroidered image of a bleeding heart dove has been affixed. This image recalls the well-known Catholic devotion to the Sacred Heart, a symbol of ultimate sacrifice and boundless love. Eschewing the popular tradition of mother and child paintings in the Philippines, Javier gave the title Mother or Child, emphasising the selflessness of mothers in the face of a child’s grave illness.