Melanie Banayat's artistic drive goes beyond self-expression - the inspiration of her latest work helped her avoid personal catastrophe.
Haunted by the skeletons of broken marriages in her former home of Bend, Ore., Banayat was fighting heavy bouts of depression, and growing increasingly worried about how her circumstances threatened her health.
With heart disease running high in her family (her father died of a heart attack at 37), the now-42-year-old artist shared a vulnerability to hypertension and had to make a change or face uncertain consequences.
So she headed for the border.
"I was stressed out, not doing well health wise, and I ended up checking out, going to Mexico for six months to decompress from everything, live in a small village, and paint," Banayat said.
This hiatus from mainstream society that began in 2006 sparked a series of works that poured out of her as she looked for spiritual reconciliation.
Banayat's awareness of the issues women face in society grew from conversations with women facing dilemmas like her own.
"I realized that I wasn't alone, and I kept going. And even when I went down to Mexico, I continued talking to other women, and they would just come out and spill the beans about the struggles they went through," she said.
Banayat said the town of Ajijic, in the State of Jalisco in South Central Mexico, is where she found her connection, translating the stories into paintings of women "in a state of peace, transformation, contemplation and rejuvenation."
"I wanted to paint positive images - not too corny or anything. I wanted to them to be beautiful but uplifting, because I was having such a difficult time pulling myself out of the depression, so that's what all these images ended up coming from," she said.
Banayat said she started painting with oils about 15 to 20 years ago, employing a technique called "fat over lean," a traditional technique associated with classic master painters in which the artist allows each layer of a painting to dry before putting on additional applications.
Banayat said she had two years of college training in art but her life took a different path after marrying at a young age.
"For a lot of years I regretted it, but now I'm actually glad, because I think my best teacher is my technique itself, and my subject matter has been just been living and doing. I feel like if I'd had more training, I would have ended up painting like my instructors, instead of like me, and I'd have to unlearn everything that I learned," she said.
Banayat said her work reflects the influence of French post-impressionist painter Paul Gauguin in her color scheme and Mexican artist Frida Kahlo.
Van Gogh's Ear gallery on Whiskey Row recently featured Banayat's work before she took it to the International Art Expo in Las Vegas.
An art representative at the expo selected Banayat and four other artists to show in a high-end showroom in the World Market Center in Las Vegas, a design center open to home furnishing designers, architects, and other wholesale buyers.
Banayat said the reps from the expo were looking for artists sensitive to social causes.
"Each one of us had these issues that we supported on our own, and they thought it would be (inspiring) to have group of artists that felt strongly that way," she said.
Banayat has launched a line of greeting cards based on the theme of her portraits of women, available at www.miligirl.com.
She is donating $5 of each copy of her 2008 Calendar sold in the month of February to the "Go Red for Women" campaign and to recognize National Heart Month.
Banayat will show at the Scottsdale Fine Art and Wine Festival on the weekend of Feb. 15; the Carefree Fine Art and Wine Festival on Feb. 29; and the Fountain Hills Fine Art and Wine Affaire the weekend of March 21. To view her art or to purchase her calendar, visit www.banayatfineart.com.
