Salisha Stanley's works of art: A virtual mind field

Trinidad and Tobago News Day:  by DEBBIE JACOB

SALISHA “Salli” Stanley lives in the world of her paintings, with images that pop up any time: while reading a book, washing wares, walking in a park or trying to fall asleep. She describes her work as a “collection of life.”

Images appear to inhabit a space between the real world and the spirit world, with yellow-green skies and figures as delicate as gossamer. Images feel as though they float off into some unknown space.

“I’m painting the dream world,” she says at Medulla Art Gallery, Woodbrook, where her first solo exhibition, Mind Field, opened on July 11.

“There are spirits or mythical creatures in meditation or participating in some ritual. I don’t plan the paintings. An image – a mental photograph – just comes all at once. I go and paint that image – a snapshot in my mind – or write down the idea for the painting,” says the soft-spoken artist.

Her paintings feel deep and symbolic – something just out of reach for those who view her work. Yet they compel you to move closer and think deeper.

“My paintings symbolise something, but I’m not sure what. I think about the meaning after the images come. I don’t always know what the painting symbolises, but I know something is waiting to be discovered.”

Most of Stanley’s paintings were completed in Grande Riviere during the covid19 pandemic, which isolated us from 2020-2022. Those paintings capture soft light and convey hope on the horizon during that fearful time.

“The landscape in Grande Riviere has a lot to do with the paintings. There’s always the horizon blending into the beach that defines my work done there.”

Stanley, 32, grew up in Toco with her aunt’s family. Her early upbringing, with a schizophrenic mother and grandmother, created a surreal world where the line between reality and imagination blurred, but felt natural.

“Maybe their experiences shaped me,” she said. “My grandmother was very spiritual and always talked to God.”

For a time, Stanley’s grandfather home-schooled her, because he believed formal education was corrupt. There were no siblings – just nature to explore. She noted the colours and the textures of life around her.

She sees her Spiritual Baptist grandparents’ influence in many of the figures in her paintings, who are looking down in a gaze that suggests worshipping or meditating. Many paintings include vessels: vases and bottles with smoke or mist twirling towards the sky and evoking mystery and mysticism.

Her art teacher at St Joseph Secondary School recognised Stanley’s artistic talent and encouraged her to study art. At UWI, she studied art theory, which created a bridge for her passion: exploring the psychology of art.

“Art can show you another place. It’s like a doorway you find yourself walking through. Painting that place makes that space real.

Pink and green are her favourite colours to work with. Green often sets the tone and mood of her pieces. Lighter greens, with their yellow filter, create softness and hope; darker greens create depth and mystery. She uses a lot of pink dots in her paintings. They require time and patience, and feel therapeutic.

“I enjoy doing the dots,” she says. “Their purpose is up for interpretation. They could be specks of light.”

Stanley never forces an interpretation onto her work and feels no desire to influence anyone’s interpretation. She believes everyone will see and experience something different. Meaning is something personal and often depends on prior experience.

Although the landscape plays an important part in her paintings, every painting has a figure that claims the special space she captures.

Some women look Amerindian, others African or East Indian. Many are culturally and ethnically ambiguous. Sometimes her figures divulge their features during the act of painting. Figures might start as a silhouette – a shadow waiting to reveal a face. Faces might change during the painting.

“I might not see their faces when they first come to me. I never know what they will look like. They just take shape. But I start with the figure when I paint. I try to figure out something about them that will make you think, ‘What is this place and what are they doing there?’ I’m not looking at real people.”

Stanley works on multiple paintings at the same time. She doesn’t plan the size of them – the picture she sees in her mind dictates the space it needs and miniature replicas of larger paintings often emerge.

It’s challenging to narrow down a particular style for Stanley’s paintings. She experiments with collage and cubism.

If there is an overall theme that ties all the paintings together, Stanley says it would be the imagination – “particularly where it comes from.”

She’s always searching for an answer to that question.

“I like to blur the lines between what is real or not real. I am trying to figure out what the imagination is and how we can use it.”

She thinks of the imagination as a spiritual world.

“As humans, we like to dream a lot. We’re obsessed with being in a place other than where we are physically,” she explains.

As a mother now, she’s in a new space. While she was pregnant during the pandemic, she says no artistic visions appeared, but they returned after her son Giovanni was born. Her partner, Italian-born Piero Guerrini, who settled in Grande Riviere and made Mt Plaisir Hotel a famous international spot for turtle-watching, is her biggest supporter. He encourages her artistic expression, cooks and plays with their son so that Stanley gets all the time she needs to paint.

Together they are building a new life in Dominica in a perfect, secluded spot with lush green mountains that Guerrini and Stanley feel will be perfect for her painting. Their dream is to create an artists’ retreat there.

Salisha Stanley’s art exhibition, Mind Field, runs for the rest of July at Medulla Art Gallery, 37 Fitt Street, Woodbrook. Enter through Cocobel Chocolates, walk down the spiral staircase to the gallery and be prepared to explore a place you never imagined.