Ricky Villabona

Having been a TV commercial director and a fashion photographer, Ricky Villabona has a unique eye for things that relate to his life in fashion and advertising. There are bold colors, repetitions of elements and patterns that could very well be printed on fabric.

His background in graphic design also piqued his interest in creating text-based art. There are instances when he has painted words or short sentences in his handwriting, which he expanded by repetitiously following the curves of the words he painted.

Like a lot of painters, Villabona paints like it is a form of meditation. In most of his paintings, he starts with a figure or a splash of color, and allows the painting to tell him where to go. As such, the practice has become meditative. Sometimes, the words he incorporated in his text-based art can take on a personal and a completely different meaning from what was originally intended.

Sometimes, the words take on a new personal meaning for me, different from what I had intended when I began the works. It reminds me of how we treat mantras in meditation. The mantra can change in repetition. It remains the same, but it is not the same. I feel that this meditative practice is echoed in my painting.

At times when the artist has a broad idea of what to paint with a vague concept of how it looks like, he lets himself paint it on the canvas as an opportunity for him to play with colors. By doing so, he stays true to his philosophy of making art to meditate and converse, all the while allowing his works to go anywhere, artistically. Although Villabona has made other artworks with more detailed methods, the artist finds fulfillment in working with something that has no clear end in sight.

Aside from his radical methods, his artworks tend to leverage towards bright and luminous colors. A nod to his background in fashion and advertising, his well-thought choice of colors is also associated with artificial imagery and hyperrealism. Instead of incorporating people and other living subjects, his fascination as a photographer in capturing the human-like emotions of inanimate objects reflected in his fascination for colors that give the illusion of luminance.