ISABELLA MELLADO

Isabella Mellado works with the tarot as both a magic medium and subject matter for her paintings. Her reinterpretations of the tarot archetypes are contemporary self-portraits that bring her own identity and environment into the works. Two of Cups is a new, large-scale painting of tarot in which two cups signify water and emotions, speaking to duos, relationships, connection, and collaboration—the card calls for people to co-create.  

Isabella Mellado is a painter from San Juan, Puerto Rico. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts at the Rhode Island School of Design in 2018 and her Masters in Fine Arts at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2023. Mellado is best known for her magical realist paintings that address latinidad, queer identity and tarot. She works in a wide range of media including painting, photography, costume design, digital collage and sculpture. Her work has been featured at Kavi Gupta Gallery in Chicago, IL; Walter Otero Contemporary Art in San Juan, PR; Pulse Contemporary Art Fair in Miami, FL; The Ponce Biennial in Ponce, PR and MECA Art Fair in San Juan, PR, among others. Mellado has also completed residency at Oxbow in Saugatuck, MI, the Studios at Mass MoCA in North Adams, MA and the Vermont Studio Center in Johnson, VT.