Self-taught visual artist Mylene “Myse” Salonga, a beauty from Batangas, has been praised, well, yes, for her movie-star looks, but more importantly for her big heart. This is because the sale of her paintings is always for a worthy cause, for beneficiaries like children in need in the Philippines and in other countries like Uganda and Tanzania in Africa.

The artist is from Padre Garcia town. Her late father was a politician and her mother a businesswoman. Salonga would design the products of their family-run handicrafts business. Thus, from the start she had an aptitude for art, although with no formal education.

She took up marketing and business at the Philippine School of Business Administration (PSBA) Manila, and made the capital city her home after graduating. Later, she had her old house demolished, constructed a more modern residence and filled it with her own paintings.

Artist Mylene Salonga

During the house blessing, one of the guests approached her and said he liked her work and offered to buy one painting. “Oh no,” Salonga replied. “These are my paintings, they are not for sale.” Then the potential buyer and art lover mentioned a steep price.

“It was a price I couldn’t resist,” said the artist, giggling, during a recent conversation at the Manila Hotel’s Champagne Room. Present during the interview was Carmela Geisert, a friend and colleague. The two women artists will participate in the Grand Palais international exhibit in Paris.

But I am getting ahead of the story.

This work, “Timeless,” will be shown in Paris on Feb. 18-22.

200 paintings

That first purchase led to Salonga’s more serious career as an artist. Through word of mouth, her reputation spread among certain art lovers and collectors and within a decade she was able to produce 200 paintings, most of which were sold. One painting was donated to the Philippine Embassy in Paris. The work is titled “Marianne,” a French symbol of womanhood and is part of the embassy’s collection that recognizes the life of an OFW.

Salonga has not joined any major beauty contest. She is not into being a Miss Philippines, a Miss This or Miss That, my impression being she has time only for more important activities. And yet she has won honors related to beauty and culture. She has been crowned “Noble Queen of Culture and Arts” at an international pageant at Cities Events Place, Manila. This is given to individuals who have made significant contributions to society and charitable events.

A Mylene Salonga painting in London’s Waterloo Station

At a charity fashion show in Okada Hotel, Parañaque City, she was acclaimed the “Darling of the Crowd.” And again at Okada last October, she was given the Asean Excellence Achievers Award.

The artist’s oeuvre includes modern abstractions, figurative art, landscapes, seascapes and surrealism. She had one solo show at Camp John Hay, Baguio. She was part of recent group shows in Grand Westside Hotel in Parañaque and in Belmont Hotel in Mactan, Cebu. She’s also had international shows in Singapore and Mayenne, Laval, and Paris in France.

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Billboard in New Yorks’ Times Square displays paintings of Mylene Salonga

What impresses one is that some of her works have been displayed as billboards in Times Square, New York, and in London’s Waterloo Station. How did she develop these contacts in the US and Europe? “They saw it on the internet,” she explained. “They just contacted me. I am really into business but I have been blessed, so this is my way of paying back. Most of my activities are associated with charity.”

What are her inspirations? “If I do landscapes, the scenery is my inspiration,” Salonga said. “Actually my greatest inspirations are my clients. It’s not the price, wala na sa akin yon. Basta alam ko na sa puso nila ang paintings ko. (I just know that my paintings are in their hearts.) It’s how they appreciate my paintings.”

Salonga and Geisert Paris exhibit is on Feb. 18-22—they are the only Filipinos in the international show. And there’s another exhibit in Vienna in June.

Look out, Europe. Here she comes again.