Beautiful Bougainvilleas

Melissa Villaseñor captures the dream-like and ephemeral qualities of these fleeting blooms in her primary body of work

“Bougainvillea & Blue Dragonfly”, 2022, 24 x 36 inches oil on canvas

It is often said that life imitates art. But in the case of Melissa Villaseñor, art most definitely imitates life. As one steps into her Antipolo home, one is immediately transported to a wondrous idyll where a carpet of dried bougainvilleas greets you on your path. And the view from the home’s wide windows is framed by lush bougainvilleas of every color and variety.

Because of this, it is no surprise that the artist is so inspired by these beautiful flora. Melissa Villaseñor captures the dream-like and ephemeral qualities of these fleeting blooms in her primary body of work, which is distinguished by such lightness and softness, almost as if no hard lines are drawn and there are just colors, light, and shadow blending into each other in a light and airy chiaroscuro.

Sharply contrasting with her floral paintings are Villaseñor’s newly created abstract works. Diverging from the softness of her florals in oil, her abstracts done in acrylic are highly gestural and contrasting. She uses bolder colors in her abstract work, revealing yet another aspect of the artist’s surroundings. Less known to most is that her home is also the base of operations for her family’s garment business, where machinery and bulks of fabric have become the inspiration for her latest foray into the abstract. The effect is a dichotomy of form and style at play in her most recent exhibition at Art Lounge Manila – The Podium, “Bougainvillea At Iba Pa.”

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