Visual artist Camille Dela Rosa captures the fleeting beauty of nature
Camille Dela Rosa has put on many hats when it comes to expressing herself artistically. She appeared on screen as a young star of the ’90s show Ang TV. She also demonstrated her acting prowess on stage under the direction of theater icons Audie Gemora, Tony Mabesa, and Bhen Cervantes. But much like her father, the late visual artist Ibarra Dela Rosa, the 40-year-old creative found the most joy and freedom in expressing herself through painting.
Her father never taught her how to paint, but Camille inherited his mastery of the canvas, mixing colors and recreating the beauty of nature with her brushstrokes. Her dad passed away in 1998 and Camille decided to follow in his footsteps, pursuing a career in the arts with the help of her mother. Since then, she has been producing exhibit after exhibit celebrating her gift and honoring her father’s legacy.
“Honestly, my late dad never wanted me to be an artist like him,” she says. “He never taught me how to paint nor brought me to any of his exhibitions. He just let me draw whatever I wanted without telling me what to study or to improve my skill. The only word I would hear from him as I showed him my drawings was ‘beautiful,’ and then he would me pay one peso for the drawing.”
Camille remains steadfast in her mission to create fantasy worlds through painting. She unveils her latest works presenting idyllic flora. Dubbed “Floral Waltz,” her collection is like a breathtaking view of a spring garden in full bloom, inviting everyone to imagine a place where the air is perfumed with the sweet scent of flowers and allow people to savor the fleeting beauty of nature.
“At the moment, my focus is solely on the enrichment of my craft and to leave a legacy with a distinct style and subject synonymous or akin to my name,” says Camille. “My goal as an artist is to breathe peace and serenity onto the canvas so it may be experienced by the spectator.”
After exploring her father’s works through The Legacy, the depths of surrealism through Aenigma and Dominion, and the allure of femininity through her Enchantress series, Camille comes full circle in her artistic journey by going back to her impressionist approach. Guiding her in “Floral Waltz” is a narrative about biological existence. It details the journey of flowers, from delicate buds to their full growth to their wilting stage. It is their lifecycle that prompts the artist to immortalize them on her canvas while infusing them with her own personal symbolisms.
Her flowers are presented in poetic motions matched with her colors unblended to mimic natural light. Aeterna captures flowers and branches in an elegant tangle as if they are dancing in the breeze. Spotlighting nature’s unique color play is her Flora and Rosa paintings while Shroud of Beauty depicts a haunting bouquet of blooms kissed by the early morning light.
Through “Floral Waltz,” Camille continues to express her curiosity about the eloquence of flowers as the language of decoration and human feelings. Flowers blossom, compete, and sometimes unite as they traverse her canvas, creating a dialogue between dainty and intensity, between transience and endurance, and between life and death.
“My artistic responsibility is to recreate nature from my imagination,” she says. “At the moment, I am preoccupied with discovering new themes that will comprise my new works.”
“Floral Waltz” ran at Galerie Joaquin in The Podium, ADB Avenue, Ortigas Center, Mandaluyong City.