painter amongst other things
Ellena Ruiz-Lindsey graduated in the spring of 2021 from the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa with a Bachelor's in Fine Art with a focus in painting. They work in oil and watercolor, drawing from each process' unique material potentials. She builds her abstract paintings like bodies and lived experience, layered and scarred to evoke generational trauma and systematic violence but lately they have been shifting from inside the body to the outside of the body and the similarities between body and landscape. Our bodies and land have been taken as commodity for too long so I'm depicting the fight of reclamation against the exploitation through earth toned hues. They harness watercolor’s association with intimacy to explore discomfort and unease through figurative narratives. Both threads of her work are derived from direct experience, filtered through music and queer writings. She has been working in the Bay Area as a teaching artist since 2022, working with students aged 2-16 through the Junior Center of Art and Science, Kala Art Institute, and REACH Ashland Youth Center. Galleries Ellena has shown at include Mission Cultural Center in San Francisco, Wailoa Center in Hilo, HPU Kaneohe Gallery, and 2727 Gallery in Berkeley.
ellena.ruiz25@gmail.com
