For Cebuano illustrator Alreena Levy, better known in local creative circles as Arteena Lefty, art began in notebooks, storybooks from school fairs and Sunday comics that showed her how a drawing could move, speak and make people laugh.
Born and raised in Bogo City, Cebu, she traces that first spark to the storybooks her mother used to buy for her. “What made me want to draw were the storybooks my mom would buy me from school fairs. I remember one called Maria Marungis,” she said in an interview with SunStar Lifestyle. What stayed with her was not only the story but the image — a watercolor page with a burnt pandesal so real it left a mark on her. From there, she kept drawing.
The Sunday papers became her classroom. Garfield, Dandy, Hagar, Archie and Pupung taught her that a strip did not need to be long to land. It only needed timing, feeling and a sharp eye for ordinary life.
Drawing Cebu
Her style blends playful humor with traditional Filipino imagery, giving her work a Cebuano warmth that feels both familiar and original.
Years later, that instinct still guides her work.
Alreena’s illustrations are rooted in Binisaya, Cebuano humor and the textures of everyday life. In “Unang Kadaugan,” published in 2021, she reimagines the Battle of Mactan through a more local and human lens, drawing from history without flattening the people in it.
After reading Pigafetta and joining online talks on precolonial history, she wanted to tell the story differently. “I wanted to highlight more on our locals, what they ate, their strategies and what enraged them to defeat these foreigners,” she said.
That urge to localize and humanize is what gives her work its pull. Her art does not just depict Cebu. It sounds like Cebu. It carries the ease of the language, the warmth of the people and the bright, slightly chaotic energy of a city that knows how to celebrate even while carrying its burdens.
“There’s something about Cebu’s laidback lifestyle but also festive when it comes to celebrations that I want to capture in my art,” she said.
That spirit shows up in Pista Playing Cards, her playful custom deck where the suits are reimagined through Filipino and Cebuano symbols: kamunggay leaves, inihaw, meats, paypay fans and puso. It is a reminder that local stories do not need to be translated into something else to matter.
Process, pace
Her process has also changed over time. Digital work gave her freedom, but publishing brought structure. Projects like “Pista,” “Unang Kadaugan” and “Maya Malipayon,” published in 2025, required timelines, revisions and a slower pace. The shift was practical, but it also sharpened her sense of responsibility to the work and to the people behind it.
Alreena says art cannot be forced. “Maya Malipayon” was assigned in January but she finished only in July, working slowly to avoid burnout. “My hand would literally hurt” after long days of drawing and coloring, she says, so she is grateful her publisher and her collaborator gave her enough time. By contrast, “Unang Kadaugan” was pushed out in 2021 for the 500th-anniversary deadline, and she even had a friend help with drafts because heartbreak made her own pages feel off. Looking back, she calls “Maya Malipayon” a redemption project.
Collaboration became part of the discipline.
When she worked with writers, she treated the process like a conversation, sending pages in batches and checking whether the visual tone matched the text. Behind the screen, she still keeps an idea book where thoughts are scribbled down before they become finished work.
Grief, renewal
The past year brought a different kind of pause. After her mother’s passing, she stepped back to rest and grieve. It was a difficult silence, but also a necessary one. Her mother had been her first champion, the person who encouraged her to pursue Fine Arts and introduced her to cartoonist Larry Alcala. Grief, in that sense, has become part of the work itself.
“I have this concept in mind where I’ll sculpt myself out of clay on canvas, just resting,” she said. “I want to title it ‘rest; at peace’.”
That idea of movement without haste sits at the center of Alreena’s creative life. She speaks often of showing up not as performance but as practice — for workshops, for communities, for collaborations, for the version of herself that still believes in making things by hand.
Her path has taken her from early competitions to publishing opportunities and exhibitions, but one thread runs through it all: keep appearing, keep drawing, keep trusting the work.
Advice for younger artists
For younger artists, that is her advice. “If you can easily show up to events because your friends, crush or idols are there, then I hope you also show up to events and moments you are passionate about, even if you are alone,” she said. “So even if you don’t know anyone there, and you aren’t sure how things will turn out, there is still something magical happening in the background when you show up. Because it sparks something.”