Emilio Villalba: Everything is Something

Everything is Something (2025). Foreword by Joanne Northrup, Executive Director and Chief Curator, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art. Essays by Allison C. Smith, Ph.D., Professor, Art History and Chair, Art History and Humanities, Johnson County Community College and Annie Dauber.

This 69-page artist catalogue features paintings and works on paper that encompass Emilio Villalba’s artistic practice across three recent exhibitions: Everything is Something, Dolby Chadwick Gallery, 2024; Everything is Something, Nerman Museum, 2024; and Paintings from Home, Dolby Chadwick Gallery, 2025.

"I can only paint what I truly know, what I see myself reflected in," says Villalba. From intimate portraits of his wife, Michelle, and his closest friends, to amalgamations of objects that could be found in his kitchen, his studio, the market, or the street, the artist builds scenes from his life by way of his unique visual language.

Emilio Villalba (b. 1984) received a Master of Fine Arts in Painting from the Academy of Art University, San Francisco in 2012 and a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Animation from the Art Institute of California, Santa Ana in 2006. He has exhibited extensively in San Francisco and New York City, and has collaborated with the international fashion house Valentino. His work was recently acquired by the Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento and the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art in Kansas.