Artist and actor, Ayla Marie Decaire will soon be heading from her Long Beach home to the Big Apple. After spending the past five years in Long Beach and working at Bogart’s Coffee House in Seal Beach for two years, Decarie is moving to New York to continue her artistic journey at Columbia University.
As a kind of farewell to her local area, and her recent employer, Decaire painted a mural on the side wall of Bogart’s and the coffee house held a premier of the latest public art piece on Sunday afternoon. Along with entertainment and snacks, the shop unveiled the finished piece, which brings together a colorful mix of nature and coffee.
“It’s a big cup of rainbow love,” Decaire said.
Decaire said she knew as a young child that she wanted to be an artist. She grew up in Florida and then moved to Northern California around the age of 18. But her family lived outside of any of the big cities. She grew up in nature and nature has been a big part of her art. Trees are her favorite thing in the world, she said. But she also said she sometimes gets inspiration from her dreams.
“I had a dream I was getting ice cream with Frida Kahlo and when I woke up, I thought ‘now I paint her’ so I did,” Decaire said.
Though she’s never taken any art classes, she’s studied artists on her own and says that Monet made a strong impression on her love of art. Paintings like his ‘Water Lilies’ spoke to her and she has always incorporated nature into her work.
Many of her portraits of women, including Kahlo, show them wearing head dresses à la Carmen Miranda, but instead of fruit, the head dresses are flowers, or trees, or mushrooms. Her latest mural at Bogarts incorporates coffee with mountains, the ocean, sunshine, leaves and rainbows.
So far Decaire has only sold paintings, including commissioned murals, but she has been selling them for about 10 years. But her artistic endeavors run the gamut. She’ll work in clay, embroidery, puppet making and anything she can use as a medium.
“I do anything I can get my hands on, anything I can do, as long as it can be colorful and fun,” Decaire said.
When she gets to Columbia, she will begin pursuing a Masters in Fine Arts in acting, while also continuing her love of all things creative. Decaire can be followed on Instagram at @notjustayla and @aylasartnsoul.
