Mother of Resilience by Iyanuoluwa Babalola
Explore Mondoir Studio
Medium: Acrylic on Canvas
Dimensions: 24 x 36 in
Year: 2026
Price: $1200.00 USD
Status: available
This piece is a tribute to my late Mother, whose strength carried our family after the sudden loss of my father when I was fourteen. Promises of help faded, and the full weight of survival house rent, school fees, food, and daily bills rested on her shoulders alone. Yet she stood firm, raised us with unwavering determination and never allowed hardship to define our future. I created this piece from memory and gratitude, using a strained posture, sweat on her skin, and the heavy physical load of labeled containers as symbols of the invisible burdens many parents carry in silence. She bends under pressure, but she does not break. Mother of Resilience represents sacrifice, endurance, and love expressed through responsibility. Though deeply personal, but speaks to a shared human experience, honoring every parent or guardian who carried more than their share so others could stand.
Why collect this work?
A bent figure is made structurally inseparable from the containers tied around her, turning responsibility into a burden that is both bodily and visibly organized.
- Babalola identifies the subject as his late mother and the painting as an act of memory and gratitude. That personal account clarifies the work’s emphasis on caregiving without making endurance appear effortless.
- In the photograph, the figure’s bowed head and long diagonal back oppose the rigid, rectangular vessels. Ropes cross her neck and torso, while scattered pale marks register as sweat and intensify the sense of exertion.
- The documented acrylic medium supports sharp contours and strong separation between the dark figure, bright containers, and broken surrounding field. This clarity makes each item legible while compressing them into one dense load.
- The painting gives domestic expenses and parental duty a material equivalent: portable containers become units of accumulated obligation. It is particularly useful for considering how figurative painting can make often-unseen care work publicly visible.
About the Artist
Iyanuoluwa Babalola
Iyanuoluwa Babalola is an artist on Mondoir Studio. Artistic discipline: Painting/ Acrylic and on Canvas. Based in Lagos, NG.
Nationality: Nigerian
My art explores healing, identity, cultural memory, and moral consciousness through expressive painting and visual storytelling.
