Izabella Thomas

I am a visual artist based in USA. I paint oil on canvas.

My goal as an artist is to provide through my art a vision of the world that incorporates realism, magic and the voiceless ghosts of experience. I bring an immigrant's lived life of being settled and unsettled at the same time where the familiar and unfamiliar are constantly intermingling.

I would describe my style of painting as Magical Realism. When I was a young girl, I fell in love with Magical Realism books by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Isabel Allende, Julio Cortazar and others. I still like Magical Realism but now I paint it.

I try and tell stories through my paintings, short stories that each viewer of my painting can then take and re-imagine according to their own lived lives. I find myself in astonishment as to what they see and what they bring to what is there. I am firmly of the opinion that art helps us exist in this world just as much as air and it brings joy as well as insight to that existence.

Self-taught painter

Masters in Business Administration, Finance
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University 1998

Bachelor of Science, Business Administration, Finance
The American University, Washington, D.C. 1994

June 5 2023 I was accepted into the Artists' Undertaking Gallery in Occoquan, VA

May 11, 2023 One of my paintings (“The Mannequin Story”) was selected to participate in the art show at the Atlantic Council Distinguished Leadership Awards Ceremony at the Anthem in Washington, D.C.

November 25, 2022-present I was juried into becoming a full member at the Studio Gallery DC, one of the oldest cooperative galleries in the Washington, D.C. area. Four of my paintings were featured in the New Members Exhibit. (Jan. 4-28th)

August 5-28, 2022 My painting called “Sweet Dreams” was selected for the Juried Show at the Foundry Gallery, Washington, DC

December 4, 2021 Artists in Residence dual show, Truro Clubhouse, Fairfax, VA