Isabella Mellado is a painter and educator native to San Juan, Puerto Rico. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts at the Rhode Island School of Design in 2018 and her Masters in Fine Arts at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2023. Mellado is best known for her magical realist paintings on latinidad, queer identity and tarot. She works in a wide range of media including painting, photography, costume design, digital collage and sculpture.
Mellado is a 2023 Teacher Institute Fellow at the Museum of Contemporary Arts Chicago as well as a Spring 2023 Teaching Fellow at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her work has been featured at art fairs such as Material Art Fair in Mexico City, MX; The Ponce Biennial in Ponce, PR; Pulse Contemporary Art Fair in Miami, FL and MECA Art Fair in San Juan, PR. Additionally, Mellado has exhibited at the Bronx Museum in New York, NY; Kavi Gupta Gallery in Chicago, IL; Walter Otero Contemporary Art in San Juan, PR and Swivel Gallery in New York, NY among others.