VILLANUEVA:EPOCH 2020-2023

2 MARCH-25 MARCH 2023

EPOCH 2020-2023 brings together a collection of works produced while living in Manhattan during the pandemic. The collection of works serves as a reconciliation of my feelings, emotions, and investigations into my personal history & mythology. The works produced in this period also mark my pivot back into my fine arts practice. Before this time, my primary focus was on developing my start-up floral event company, Villanueva Designs. During those 15 years, my creative process focused on creating bespoke & innovative floral works which established the business in the competitive New York marketplace. It wasn’t until late 2019 that I slowly began shifting my focus back into creating a new body of fine-art works.  

The pivot into my fine-art practice happened slowly, as finding time to create ‘art’ was a major determining factor. The major adaptation of a newly acquired art practice occurred when I, one day, stapled a canvas directly to the floor of my floral studio. This allowed me to go about my day-to-day floral operations, and still have a sense of producing new artwork. In certain intervals, I made short documentaries of this process via time-lapsed videos, which I shared on my personal Instagram account as “Stories.” This process of documentation continues today. The short videos serve both to document the highly labored process of the making of the works and add a sense of accountability to the overall completion of the pieces.  

Fundamental to my artistic process is the research of materials, and this is seen in the varied mediums used in my work. I have most recently begun incorporating my floral knowledge, into the creation of the newest pieces, which fall under the umbrella of BioArt.

While themes in my work vary, the artwork primarily speaks to issues of identity, personal myth, social issues, questioning & reconciling my spirituality, and re-examinations of memories. The formal qualities of the presented artwork fluctuate from stark minimalism to vibrant, color-filled paintings. The time-based artworks speak to sustainability, perishability, and impermanence. Also, there is an inherent political discourse that weaves throughout the works. These topics range from immigration, nationalism, climate change, mental health, religious iconography, and value (of humans & time). All of these aspects get filtered through the lens of the Tejano diaspora.

My intention for this show is to bring these works together for the first time and to have them serve as a marker of a particular time in my life (an epoch). It is my hope that some of the aspects of this recent history represented in the artwork will communicate a shared, experience & kinship. My sincerest gratitude to the group at Chashama who have made this opportunity possible.