Shelly Madruga
San Diego, CA
I create assertive abstract artwork using fast, flowing marks and layers of grounded tone upon tone exploring gestural movement.
Message
BIO
Shelly Madruga is a contemporary painter. She creates large scale paintings using fast, flowing marks and layers of grounded tone upon tone, exploring gestural movement to create assertive abstract artwork. She lives and works in San Diego, California
GALLERIES
Huff Harrington, Atlanta, GA - 2025
City Haus Chicago, Chicago, IL - 2024 - 2025
Gallery Diderot, France, Permanent Collection - 2022, 2024
Shoppe Amber Interiors, 2022 - 2024 - Marin, Calabasas, Pacific Palisades, Newport Beach locations featuring four collections, totaling 28 paintings
GRANTS
Denis Diderot Artist Grant in 2024, 2022
RESIDENCIES
Chateau d’Orquevaux 2024, 2022
MEDIA
HGTV - Hot Properties show
Several paintings featured in a high-end home design episode
Statement
COLLECTION: The Unlayering of Emotion
In her work, Shelly creates large scale paintings using fast, flowing marks and layers of grounded tone upon tone.
She explores gestural movement to create assertive abstract artwork. Inky tones and earthy colors fill the canvas with textured, transparent layers scraping away to reveal what was once impressed upon the canvas. A sweeping score. A flash of a stroke made with a carpenter’s trowel. A deceptively simple composition. Her work is bold and unapologetic. Aggressively calm. Dynamic. Honest.
Rejecting physical form and influenced by Brancusi’s geometric shapes, Shelly confidently places one hue next to another to pull the viewer into the painting. Her work is both urgent and quiet at the same time. A dichotomy of feelings.
A layering of emotion.