Drawing His Own Life Path

As a boy and teen, Toma Villa was always drawing. He knew his calling early and considered himself an artist long before 'it paid the bills."
When the Confluence Project hired him to lead students to paint murals at schools, Villa's self-identity became reality. He has led groups of students at 30 schools, all with "different kids, different walls."

He's since been commissioned to create a number of works, including a mural for the Kraken Store at Chandler's Cove funded by corporate partner Truly Hard Seltzer. The mural will soon be installed on an outside wall of the store (check out the video).

The Confluence Project is a community-supported nonprofit that connects people to the history, living cultures and ecology of the Columbia River system through Indigenous artists via a series of outdoor installations and interpretive artworks located in public parks. Each art installation explores Native stories in collaboration with Northwest Tribes.
The mural tells the story of a young girl canoeing on a voyage to save her sister, "battling all sorts of monsters and visiting different villages." Villa says the tale has been working in his mind for a while and "there is mystery in the sea and the water."
"I had a teach who said, 'paint something you really love or paint something you are really afraid of,' " says Villa. "Off those emotions, I can put a lot more into it."