A peek into the world of Jellyfish Kisses.
Some personas are born of the fact that the person is shy. Anton Belardo created Jellyfish Kisses to break free from that. It’s creation become an armor to conquer personal limitations and find the confidence to shine—an outward visualization of her inner truth. The striking use of makeup and clothes—fairytale-meets-club-kid—became a powerful way to communicate imagination and is an extension of her practice as a visual artist. Her presentations are fantastical, re-imagined safe spaces that invite spectators to participate, let go of the ego, and just get soaked in her kaleidoscopic fantasy.
Jellyfish Kisses was in Paris recently as part of Asia Now Paris Art Fair 2022 under her gallery, Vinyl on Vinyl. The City of Light is a place to purify a creative’s devotion to their art. She talks about her Parisian adventure and how she used art to get through the pandemic.
I’m sure this trip will change you in many ways—artistically, personally, and maybe even spiritually. How has this impacted you?
I’m a curious person, and I do love devouring all the culture that one place can offer. That’s pretty much what I did with this trip: From looking at the famous paintings and sculptures to just watching how people from different backgrounds lived. The most important part of this trip was being able to finally close this chapter of my life with this work. The whole goal of the piece was to exorcise all the remaining demons that the lockdowns created. Like a lot of the people during the earlier days of the lockdown, I didn’t really cope well and slowly started doubting myself, and a lot of self-hate started to build up. I’m in a more peaceful state now; no more blaming others or myself.
Tell me about Tiny Worlds.
Like most of my shows, I created a lot of different works ranging from textile and video art to soft sculptures and presented them as a singular piece of work. The performance part of the show was the thing that glued the whole work together. This is the last installment of my lockdown series. The inspiration behind the piece came from my main work for the show, a video art called Bubbles. It’s a compilation of all the video recordings my best friend took of us while talking on different social apps 24/7 from 2020-2021; just pure, raw emotions from crying from a breakup to having moments of joy and doing mundane tasks. During the fair, I was inside a little space that represented our little bubbles during the lockdown, completely disconnected from everyone else. No sound, no talking—just subtle movements trying to convey the things that I felt during those years. Every hour, I was allowed to go out and circle the fair to signify that another hour had ended.
How did the show go?
The show went really well. The majority of the people at the fair responded to the work positively, but the best part was that people stopped and talked about the work. I heard discussions and debates about it. I noticed that the crowd during the fair was very blunt and was not shy to tell me what they thought of the work.
What does the future look like for you?
I still feel like anything is possible, and I’m excited about what I might do next. I’m just hoping that my best work has yet to come.
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