2018 saw the end of an era for local painter Mitchell Villa as he switched from acrylic paints to oil. His current exhibit, Epilogue, at Fortune Gallery, pays tribute to his bright and vibrant acrylic work as he transitions to his new medium. Villa says that the change is more practical than anything.
“All my acrylics were just drying so quickly,” he says. “Acrylic has a way faster dry time than oil, so to be able to come back the next morning and the paint isn’t all dry, or come back a couple days later… my paint is still good to be working with. I just found I was kind of limited with what I could do with acrylic paint. There’s a lot more possibilities with oil.”
One of those possibilities is the opportunity to work on multiple pieces at once. Currently, Villa has three on the go.
“When a painting is wet all over,” he says, “it’s nice to jump over and switch out to something different.”
But while Villa is switching his painting materials, the bright colours and pop-art vibe he brings to his work is here to stay.
“It will definitely be the same style I’ve always painted in,” he says, “but it will just be oil.”
So, what can patrons expect from Villa’s acrylic send off? A blend of local street scenes and quirky portraits; the ways in which these pieces came to fruition are as unique as the works themselves.
“I’ve got a lot of street scenes of Victoria, and that was just for one show, so I did a run of that. And then all my other stuff is just kind of inspired from daily life,” he says, adding that while he admits it sounds cliché, “it’s just kind of the things that go in have a tendency to come out.”
While there is definite stylistic cohesion between his pieces, Villa says he prefers painting people to buildings.
“I definitely prefer doing figurative work,” he says. “Buildings are a little boring, but every once in a while it breaks it up. I did the Chinatown piece first, and that was just because I had never done a cityscape before, so I just kind of wanted to try it… People were pretty into it, so I did a full series.”
In addition to his older acrylic works, Epilogue also sees the debut of three new-to-Victoria pieces: Motel, Gastown 1971, and Hell Hounds. Villa admits he has a soft spot for Motel and the mental images it evokes because he’s “drawn to old, dingy hotels and things like that.” As for Hell Hounds, he says that it came together with ease, despite its intricate detailing.
“That was actually super quick because I had the idea and was just able to execute it really quickly,” Villa says. “The painting process wasn’t that long at all. I think it was only like two weeks or a week and a half or something to do those dogs.”
Epilogue
Until Monday, April 16
Various days and times, Fortune Gallery
fortunegallery.ca