Flower Girl 1 by Iyanuoluwa Babalola
Explore Mondoir Studio
Medium: Acrylic on Canvas
Dimensions: 20 x 30 in
Year: 2025
Price: $350.00 USD
Status: available
Flower Girl 1 began as a quiet sanctuary, a gentle return to self through the healing language of nature. I wanted to capture the moment when we step away from the world’s demands and allow ourselves to exist without performance. Here, softness is not fragility. It is protection, permission, and strength. The flowers resting over her eyes do not blind her. Their petals soothe and guide her inward, toward breath, stillness, and the private places where healing begins. I painted her skin in deep, luminous blues to hold the calm of night and water, while the vivid reds of the blossoms carry warmth, life, and renewal. Against the earthy, restless background, her composed presence becomes an refuge from noise. The bold contours surrounding her suggest the pressure and movement of the outside world, yet she remains open, vulnerable, and safely rooted within herself. Through this painting, I hope to offer a pause. I want viewers to remember that growth does not have to announce itself. It can unfold softly, slowly, and peacefully, like a flower opening when no one is watching.
Why collect this work?
A frontal figure is made inaccessible through two flowers placed over the eyes, shifting portraiture from recognition toward a tension between concealment, protection, and inward attention.
- Babalola describes his practice as exploring healing, identity, and cultural memory. Here, his stated aim of creating a “quiet sanctuary” is tested by the flowers’ forceful interruption of the face.
- In the photograph, pale highlights model the blue face while red blossoms project beyond its contour. The closed-off gaze and parted lips split expression between visual withdrawal and bodily presence.
- Catalogued as acrylic on canvas, 20 by 30 inches, the painting uses sharply bounded colour areas to separate face, flowers, and background, while repeated irregular outlines keep the surrounding field active.
- Encountering this work within contemporary portraiture focuses attention on what a face can communicate when its conventional point of contact is withheld, and whether concealment can function as agency rather than erasure.
About the Artist
Iyanuoluwa Babalola
Iyanuoluwa Babalola is an artist on Mondoir Studio. Artistic discipline: Painting/ Acrylic and on Canvas. Based in Lagos, NG.
Nationality: Nigerian
My art explores healing, identity, cultural memory, and moral consciousness through expressive painting and visual storytelling.
