Mayling Pao, born in Nicaragua, is a renowned illustrator and body painter from South Florida. She attended the New World School of the Arts in Miami and earned her BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute. Pao began her career as an intern and freelancer for the Kansas City Star newspaper, where she has published over 20 color illustrations.
Impersonators of Xipe Totec—or IXT for short—is her shared studio, which features creative services such as pre-production, illustrations, body painting, fine art, and murals. Xipe Totec, meaning “Our Lord the Flayed One,” was a Mesoamerican deity worshipped by various cultures, especially the Aztecs. He was associated with agriculture, vegetation, seasons, goldsmiths, and regeneration.
Drawing inspiration from ancient deities like Xipe Totec, Pao often produces deeply symbolic and thought-provoking works.
“I’m a visual artist, and I work with different media,” says Pao in a phone conversation from her home studio. “My favorite to work with is acrylic paint on canvas, and I’ve done murals, but the other main art form that I do is paper mache sculpture. I tend to reuse materials and try to recycle them. I feel like the paper mache lends itself to that.”
Pao makes papiér mache sculptures and props. Her fine art paintings are figurative and lately inspired by mythological stories of goddesses from different cultures. She has used the same inspiration for the murals and body paintings that she has done.
Pao has a unique perspective and style, merging cultural heritage with contemporary art.
Her color-drenched paintings feature lush backgrounds with subjects, mostly women, engaged in contemplative poses or nurturing children. Flowers, elaborate hairdos, and jewelry convey a strong sense of feminine spirituality.
Her floral works are bold and colorful, with blooms that burst forth and shimmer in the sunlight.
Of the work she says “My paintings are expressive, figurative works that usually depict women, and sometimes influenced by goddess mythology from Latin American cultures. My charcoal drawings are realistic portrait studies.”
Recently, on October 26, crazy hybrid critters paraded down Clematis Street thanks to an imaginative project spearheaded by local Pao. Answering an art call put out by the city, she came up with the idea.
“They had a call out for a mini place-making grant. I submitted and was chosen as one of the four people. My idea was the Fantastical Walk,” Pao recalls. “We did four workshops at the Mandel Public Library. During the Green Market, there was a tent with the last workshop, and for the Fantastical Walk, we featured all the creations done at these workshops where school groups participated as well.”
Pao wanted people to be creative and not just do identifiable objects. So, she asked people if they could be their own spirit animals and encouraged them to work as a team. However, each had different ideas, which she combined. Instead of just coming up with an animal as a way to make it like a fantastical creature, they thought of two or three animals and combined them. Like the alebrije, a bright and colorful animal hybrid seen in Mexican folk art to celebrate the magic of creativity and the beauty of a more ethereal and spiritual world, it was initially made of paper mache. Now, they make them out of carved wood, and they tend to be a combination of two or more animals, and they’re very colorful; they have patterns all over them.
The Fantastical Walk was a vibrant and impactful event that showcased the power of community collaboration. It celebrated the diverse and spirited people of West Palm Beach, inspiring a sense of connection and pride in the local culture.
Pao’s roots have significantly shaped her unique perspective and artistic vision. She has been teaching by merging her cultural heritage with local community engagement through art projects.
“I do a lot of teaching, and I’ve been doing those Paint and Sip parties. I’ve been contracted to teach classes at the Mandell Library – acrylic painting and drawing. And then for Hispanic Heritage Month, I was contracted to do a workshop at the Gardens branch, and I’ve been teaching some school groups. I was painting live at the Ben Hotel; they were doing a week of new painting, and the inspiration was a Florida landscape. Two of my recent paper-mache pieces were also at the Fantastical Walk.”
Pao’s artistic journey is marked by her diverse experiences. She has exhibited her fine art in galleries and art festivals in Miami, West Palm Beach, and Kansas City. Her versatility is further showcased in her role as a body painter, which she does in the haunted houses at the Fright Nights at the South Florida Fairgrounds during Halloween, covering skin with graphic patterns and designs.
Going into the new year, she is continuing the Paint and Sip classes and art classes for kids and adults.
Online at ixtstudio.com