Images courtesy of the artist and Monique Meloche Gallery. Photos: Bob.

Publisher’s Note: Earlier this year Dana Randall, Communications and Alumni Relations Manager at the Chicago Artists Coalition, sat down with CAC resident artist Pedro Montilla and Alyssa Brubaker, Director of moniquemeloche to discuss Montilla's practice and the process of working together.

By DANA RANDALL

Pedro Montilla’s work has been gaining traction over the last year, and he isn’t planning to slow down anytime soon. During a conversation with Montilla and Alyssa Brubaker, Director of Monique Meloche Gallery, the two discussed Pedro’s recent solo exhibition, *Mirar abajo*—which translates loosely to “look below”—, as well as EXPO Chicago, and what lies ahead for Montilla.

Regarding the development of *Mirar abajo*, Brubaker first encountered Montilla’s work during his Graduate Thesis Show at SAIC in 2025 while accompanying Monique Meloche and her husband, Evan Boris, a partner of the gallery and a collector. The visit came after recommendations from Shannon Stratton, Executive Director of Ox-Bow School of Art and Artists’ Residency, and Staci Boris, curator and Director of Exhibitions at SAIC. “We were really struck by his sensibility as a painter and his approach to material, subject matter, and composition,” shares Brubaker. “From there, we invited Pedro to do a solo show in our viewing room last fall, which was adjacent to our exhibition with Maia Cruz Palileo, an artist on our roster.”

The exhibition was curated with an underlying trust in Montilla’s work and support for his ideas. As Montilla describes, “being given a lot of freedom to just do my work as I normally do, very organically,” as well as “knowing the gallery’s program and also feeling very welcomed by them,” contributed to his decision to fully invest himself in the exhibition. Following his graduation, a summer fellowship at Ox-Bow in Saugatuck, Michigan further prepared him for the solo presentation and allowed him to concentrate on building a cohesive body of work.

Born in the Colombian Andes, Montilla works primarily with fique, a coarse fiber often associated with systems of transportation. In his work, the material resists functioning as a neutral support, producing images that remain open, porous, and unstable. “Fique is the main material in the work because it allows painting to be loud, to breathe, and to condition the image,” he says.

Montilla’s work behaves like a story to be unwoven. “I like poetry a lot, and I like words a lot. I wanted to aspire to do a body of work that could behave a little bit like a fable,” he shares. “The two big themes that were meaningful at the time—and archetypal themes—were both the shadow and the ground. So I gave a lot of time and attention to creating this nonlinear fable surrounding these two beings.”

Brubaker also reflected on the relationship between Montilla’s work and Maia Cruz Palileo’s exhibition, which was on view concurrently. “Serendipitously, these two shows were sort of interacting with each other, and these are two artists that hadn't met each other, but the works had so much synergy,” she shares, noting how both artists were “thinking about the land, thinking about histories, thinking about bodies being moved through borders, and even color-palette wise.” The opening included a conversation between Montilla and Palileo moderated by curator Mariela Acuña, Director of Exhibitions and Residency at Hyde Park Art Center, where the artists discussed their approaches to painting through the lens of their respective histories.

“I think that there is a very important way for me to work where I need to be able to thread ideas and images together with things that actually happen either in my life or in my dreams or things that I envision,” Montilla shares regarding his studio process and the storytelling behind his work. “But I also like to make those things broad enough that they are not specific to my own experience. That’s where I think a lot about poetry, because poetry is a way of presenting ideas that is not necessarily linear. It has a linear context for me, for sure, but I also like that images can work separately while still belonging to and behaving within a larger body of work.”

Montilla has several upcoming projects on the horizon. He recently showed work during EXPO Chicago this year in the viewing room at Monique Meloche Gallery, where a piece was acquired by a prominent private collector. His work was also included in a special group exhibition at Chicago Artists Coalition during EXPO Art Week, where he is currently an artist in residence. Additionally, this May he will participate in *Summer Delight*, a group exhibition at Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery in West Palm Beach on view from May 20–September 12, 2026. He is also preparing for a solo exhibition with Policroma Galería in Medellín, Colombia, opening June 4, 2026, and will make his debut at Art Basel Miami Beach through Monique Meloche Gallery later this year. Next year, he will exhibit work alongside Yehimi Cambrón Álvarez and Gunjan Chawla Kumar in a group exhibition curated by Jordan Barrant at Chicago Artists Coalition in March 2027. Montilla is currently a Lecturer in the Painting and Drawing Department at SAIC.

You can follow Montilla’s work through his website or on Instagram as well as at pedromontilla.com