Kwentong Bayan Collective
photo by Haseena Manek
Kwentong Bayan is a collective of two Toronto-based artists, Althea Balmes and Jo SiMalaya Alcampo. Their artistic mandate is to explore a critical and intersectional approach to community-based art, labour, and education.
Kwentong Bayan Collective have completed artist residencies at Art City St. James Town, FLAME: Art & Mentorship Program for LGBTQ2S* Spectrum Youth, and the Artists in the Library Program at the Toronto Public Library. They have been visiting artists at Kapisanan and Supporting Our Youth (SOY) programs. Kwentong Bayan have organized self-defense workshops for Live-in Caregivers that promote personal safety in their home and workplace.
Althea and Jo are currently developing the comic book, Kwentong Bayan: Labour of Love in collaboration with migrant caregivers, who work in Canada under the Caregiver Program (formerly known as the Live-in Caregiver Program).
Kwentong Bayan’s mini-comic on the history of the Live-in Caregiver Program, featuring contextual essays by Conely de Leon and Zenee May Maceda, is published in the anthology, Drawn to Change: Graphic Histories of Working-Class Struggle.
In 2017, the Graphic History Collective commissioned Kwentong Bayan to create a Remember | Resist | Redraw poster that intervenes in the Canada 150 conversation. The poster, and contextual essay by Dr. Ethel Tungohan, examines the 150+ year history of care work performed by racialized women in Canada.
In 2015, Kwentong Bayan Collective received an Access and Career Development Grant from the Ontario Arts Council to provide professional development opportunities to advance their artistic work and careers. In 2014, Althea and Jo were awarded the Min Sook Lee Labour Arts Award for artists who have captured the values of labour and social justice in their work.
Kwentong Bayan Collective have completed artist residencies at Art City St. James Town, FLAME: Art & Mentorship Program for LGBTQ2S* Spectrum Youth, and the Artists in the Library Program at the Toronto Public Library. They have been visiting artists at Kapisanan and Supporting Our Youth (SOY) programs. Kwentong Bayan have organized self-defense workshops for Live-in Caregivers that promote personal safety in their home and workplace.
Althea and Jo are currently developing the comic book, Kwentong Bayan: Labour of Love in collaboration with migrant caregivers, who work in Canada under the Caregiver Program (formerly known as the Live-in Caregiver Program).
Kwentong Bayan’s mini-comic on the history of the Live-in Caregiver Program, featuring contextual essays by Conely de Leon and Zenee May Maceda, is published in the anthology, Drawn to Change: Graphic Histories of Working-Class Struggle.
In 2017, the Graphic History Collective commissioned Kwentong Bayan to create a Remember | Resist | Redraw poster that intervenes in the Canada 150 conversation. The poster, and contextual essay by Dr. Ethel Tungohan, examines the 150+ year history of care work performed by racialized women in Canada.
In 2015, Kwentong Bayan Collective received an Access and Career Development Grant from the Ontario Arts Council to provide professional development opportunities to advance their artistic work and careers. In 2014, Althea and Jo were awarded the Min Sook Lee Labour Arts Award for artists who have captured the values of labour and social justice in their work.
Althea Balmes (Illustrator)
photo by Haseena Manek
Althea Balmes is an artist-educator rooted in community work. She uses her strong connection to her culture and her place as a diasporic Canadian woman of colour to inspire her work and as a way to connect to others.
Althea is pursuing a Master of Information degree in User Experience Design at the University of Toronto.
She teaches visual storytelling workshops throughout the city.
Website: altheabalmes.com
Althea is pursuing a Master of Information degree in User Experience Design at the University of Toronto.
She teaches visual storytelling workshops throughout the city.
Website: altheabalmes.com
Jo SiMalaya Alcampo (Writer)
photo by Dhalia Katz
Jo SiMalaya Alcampo is an interdisciplinary artist whose art practice includes community storytelling, interactive installations, and electroacoustic soundscapes.
Jo volunteers with Caregiver Connections, Education and Support Organization (CCESO) - an organization that support migrant caregivers and is a member of the Kapwa Collective - a mutual support group of Filipinx Canadian artists, critical thinkers, and healers bridging narratives between the Indigenous and the Diasporic.
Website: josimalaya.com
Jo volunteers with Caregiver Connections, Education and Support Organization (CCESO) - an organization that support migrant caregivers and is a member of the Kapwa Collective - a mutual support group of Filipinx Canadian artists, critical thinkers, and healers bridging narratives between the Indigenous and the Diasporic.
Website: josimalaya.com
