Mitch Empleo-Ventura
For multi-disciplinary artist Mitch Empleo-Ventura, the darkest moments paved the way for a blossoming career that is a testament to the healing power of art. “What boosted my creative drive,” she said, “was when I reached the lowest point of my son’s life and mine. We were abandoned and treated like outcasts.” In the last quarter of 2014, Ventura suffered from depression. “For a year and a half I was not functional,” she said. “It felt like I had lost everything and I didn’t know where to start.”
Grappling with loneliness in a big house, an abandoned art studio and a small amount of money to live on, Ventura decided to help herself. “The sessions with the psychologist were becoming too expensive,” Ventura said, adding that she decided to wean herself out of her medication, strengthen her body, and find other avenues to battle anxiety. She regained her confidence by accepting an invitation to talk about depression at PUP and participating in workshops that served as her stepping stone toward change. Her desire to refocus her vision and outlook was expressed in her new-found interest in “upcycle-ing,” adding that she likened her efforts to transform discarded and overlooked objects to unleash and celebrate its worth with her own triumph over her nervous breakdown.
Soon, Ventura said, she mustered the strength to enter the abandoned art studio. “I thought art could be the most accessible thing as a therapy. I set this aside when I got married and treated it like an enemy, I thought it was time to reconcile with it. It’s the only way for me to give value to myself. It’s the only way for me to embrace the situation that I am in.”
Graduating with a degree in fine arts, with a major in painting, Ventura participated in several group shoes and worked as graphic designer in early 2000s. She also started a company with nothing more than a personal computer and a cheap desktop printer. “It grew as the business started to acquire different types of equipment for printing,” she said, adding that her knowledge in composition, color, and executing concepts in traditional art was also useful in her position as the creative managthe ing director. “Running the business helped me fuse together the skills and the philosophies behind art, design, and fashion, all within the same platform using digital technology.”
Everyone, Ventura said, is creative to some degree. “For me art is highest form of any human activity. And creativity should be used to enlighten, expose, and advocate for what is noble and true in the world. Creativity should be used not just to impress, but also to express.”
Ventura applies different philosophies in every medium as it varies from projects related to painting, fashion, and digital designs. “With digital designs, I enjoy its accessibility and flexibility,” Ventura explained. “I can easily use them as a study for a traditional oil painting or as elements of design in digital fashion.” Digital fashion, she said, served another outlet that echoes her feminine fantasies, rooting from when she was joyfully making paper dolls as a child. The clothes are made even more special and unique as derived her paintings. “Fashion is not just glam and fabulous clothes that cover the bodies of our consumer-oriented society,” she said, “but is also a medium for expressing ideas and creativity.”
Ventura recently unveiled her collection of Digital Art iMprints on the Ramp at the Philippine Fashion Gala 2018 produced by MTP Production and Mike Tagle. “It was considered the first wearable art fashion show at that event,” she said, under the name “Lokal,” Ventura chose local models to serve as articulated dolls. She infused several digitally imprinted handwoven fabrics in some ensembles in the collection, which is part of the series of doll paintings she is working on in oil and digital fine print.
Traditional painting, Ventura said, serves as a getaway from the pressures of everyday life. “It serves as therapy and helps me free myself from anxiety and depression,” she said. The paintings reveal Ventura’s fascination for balancing the cute and quirky with dark and mysterious references, drawn to visual representations of paradox and irony within her deeply narrative and engaging pieces. While she finds inspiration from artists such as Jana Brike, Popovy Sisters, and Mark Ryden, Ventura cites life as her biggest influence.“Life is a beautiful masterpiece bound together by our experiences,” she said.
For Ventura, more than a creative process, art making is a problem solving exercise pushing her to learn more and look deeper into the subject matter. “That’s the most precious thing that I get into the diversity of doing digital designs, fashion, and painting all at the same time. After all, art is not just the finished product.”
“I didn’t decide to enter the artistic life,” Ventura said. “I was actually already in it. Everything that has transpired helped me realize and validated that fact. And I am very much thankful of everything that has happened—be it good, or bad.”