Emilio Villalba’s ever-evolving painting practice addresses the varied anxieties of modern life. Inspired by the work of Rembrandt and Velázquez, the artist first gained renown for unnerving portraiture that depicted fractured faces and floating body parts against stark black and white grounds. Villalba has since embraced more familiar domestic scenes, which nevertheless preserve his thickly impastoed brushstrokes and signature sense of unease. Villalba earned his BFA at the Art Institute of California before pursuing his MFA at the Academy of Art University. Since graduating, he has exhibited in New York, San Francisco, Montreal, and Denver and collaborated with Valentino on a capsule collection.