Martina Manalo

All of her works are abstract “because I don’t know how to draw,” she laughingly admits.
People who have seen her painting describe them as “dark, melancholic, tragic, full of angst.” She did not intend her work to be such, and she is not melancholic as a person, she avers.
“I just do whatever I feel. I don’t really have anything like I have to do this, I have to do that. It’s just whatever I feel,” she says.
Martina draws her inspiration from her travels and experiences.
“I base them on my experiences in life,” she says. “Emotions like when I’m hurt or happy. I don’t know [why] I can’t really make happy paintings. I have paintings that are colorful though, but they just don’t look happy. They just look colorful. I don’t know.”
Maybe the choice of a painter she looks up to, the Spanish surrealist Salvador Dali, may give a clue, but Martina does not want to analyze it too much.
“I usually work with black, red, blue. Sometimes it depends on how it ends up, the way I mix the colors. Sometimes I work with lighter colors like yellow, blue and green,” she tries to explain.
Martina reveals that she paints when she doesn’t have dance class. During these lull moments, she puts on alternative and indie music and immerses herself in painting.am.