Christian Ray Villanueva on Art as a Form of Self Care

Artist Christian Ray Villanueva reminisces on his life: living alone, surviving cancer, resolving trauma, and the profound power of art in his journey to self love.

This essay is a part of the series Vogue Voices, Vogue Philippines’ biweekly series of personal essays on memory, culture, moments, identity, family, and community.

These are my essentials for a great Sunday: a book in my hand, my apartment with the perfect cool temperature, several cups of tea with milk and sugar, writing in my journal, music from Ryuichi Sakamoto on my speakers, a good hot shower and a nice home cooked lunch with my friends.

Today was a particularly good day. I was reading Tove Jansson’s Finn Family Moomintroll while taking naps in between and walking around the property for some good exercise. I consider my place to be a one-legged artist’s haven. Chairs are scattered all over (just in case I get tired from hopping around doing my daily routine), the couch is made extra comfortable with nice soft pillows, books everywhere, my own little coffee and tea station, and a little studio table with good lighting to do my writing and drawings.

I took a rest from my hectic career after my therapist recommended that I should take it one step at a time, no pun intended. With this advice, I moved into a new place for a fresh start and promised myself to prioritize my well-being. I started by cooking real healthy meals for myself, mopping my floors regularly, and having plenty of sleep. I invite guests all the time to sleep over. I make chai a lot during lazy afternoons while we talk about everything under the sun.

I love seeing people relaxed and open to talk about their lives. So far, the years since I was 17 have been toward my drive for artistic excellence. I love the adrenaline art-making gives me. I love showing my work to people. I love all forms of engagement towards my art. But eight years of hyper-focus led me to burn out and I decided to give myself an enriching sabbatical where I would primarily focus on taking it easy.

Last December, I put up Christmas lights, a small make-shift tree and made orange pomanders that made my house smell spicy and warm. It was really nice. I hosted multiple dinners with my friends, spent a vacation with my fiancé, and travelled back to my province to celebrate Christmas and New Year’s Eve with my family. I try to swim as much as I can to build endurance as I often feel very lethargic with my disability. I acquired this when I was undergoing treatment for stage 3 bone cancer in my teenage years. Those years I considered hell. Chemotherapy, panic-inducing body scans, and finally, an amputation for my right leg, which left me crippled.

These past 11 years I have been trying my best to transcend those events through my work as an artist, learning several instruments, doing visual art and writing. My passion for the arts has always been my crutch in dealing with difficult memories and the daily challenges of being physically challenged. Art gave me everything I have now, the beautiful friends I have, the love of my life and a willful self. Vivienne Westwood said something about art I can never forget. She said that art makes you engage with the world around you and gives you a perspective of history yet at the same time you always have personal progress.

I always feel I am in touch with my deepest self when I’m with art, and this is especially true when I write. I love writing that has a dreamy, poetic quality that is filled with symbolism. Ideas in my work have always come from intuition and through daydreaming. The best place to get ideas in my opinion is by looking through the past, and through personal experiences, a rich treasure of material to work from. It’s almost like resolving past traumas, but also like a small vacation to different points of childhood where one experiences a vivid happiness or sadness.

There are days when it is not easy at all to live with the challenges I have, days where I have to force myself to get up. But I never allow myself to be too alienated or depressed. It always makes me smile when young, queer individuals reach out to me and say that my work relates to them deeply. It is why I risk sharing the most intimate parts of myself with my work, because it helps people not to feel alone in their situation in life. I think art should always speak deeply with plenty of heart. It should allow us to say things that we normally cannot say to the other.

When I talk to people during my lectures, I always want everyone to speak with me or to each other. Art can connect us in such a strong, profound way. I come back to this idea of transcendence, which I believe is an act of self love and liberation from the past that can chain and haunt us. This, I think, is an act of self birth, a blossoming of one’s most wonderful self by walking through the walls life puts in front of us.

Christian Ray Villanueva (b. 1998) is an artist from Cadiz City, Negros Occidental. His work primarily deals with his experiences with cancer, disability, queerness, relationships and family. He works with several mediums such as painting, drawing, music, printmaking, photography and writing, showcasing locally and internationally. He is also the founder of Drawing Class Foundation, an arts initiative in Cebu City and Metro Manila that fosters inclusivity and mindfulness.