About MoniKa
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Artist. DJ. Founder.
Starling World exists because one life was too full to fit inside one box.
I'm MoniKa Starling — painter, singer, DJ, and the person behind this brand. I make things because something in me won't stop reaching: toward the canvas, the mic, the turntable, the page. I'm based in Los Angeles. I've performed across the US and internationally. And somewhere between the studio and the stage, I built Starling World as the single place where all of it lives.
Why I Make This
The painting started as a private conversation. I was sitting with feelings that didn't have clean language yet — about what it means to be a woman, what gets taken, what gets kept, what we carry alone in the dark.
“Insomnia” came out of those 3am hours when the mind refuses to quiet. It’s a woman, awake, held inside her own silence. “Loss of Innocence” came from grief — the specific grief of watching something pure get reshaped by the world before it’s ready. These weren’t concepts I planned. They arrived, and I painted my way through them.
“Happy” surprised me. It looked simple on the surface — color, light, a face open to the room. But simple is its own kind of discipline. I had to earn that one.
“Girls Night” came from a different instinct: solidarity. Women together, unguarded, held by each other. That painting is the visual version of what I feel when I’m DJing a room full of women who finally let go.
The music and the painting aren’t two separate careers. They’re the same impulse — to hold something true, give it form, and offer it to someone who needs it. Starling World became the home where both practices could speak to each other without one having to justify itself to the other.
What You Can Collect
The originals are one-of-one paintings — acrylic, mixed media, brush pen on canvas. They go on walls and stay. If you’re starting here, the signed prints run from $15 and carry the same imagery in a format that fits any space and most budgets. The limited objects — the book, the blanket, the handbag — are made in small runs and don’t come back once they’re gone. And the music is available on all platforms: original songs, DJ mixes, performances captured live. You can collect a painting and stream the set I played the same weekend I finished it. That’s the idea. One world, multiple entry points.
Beyond the Studio
As Creative Director at Best Sound LA, I curate live music experiences — 300+ events across 30+ markets. I’ve built rooms where the sound does something to people. I’ve watched what happens when the right song hits the right crowd at exactly the right moment. That awareness lives inside my paintings. When I’m working on a piece about solidarity or intimacy, I’m thinking about the energy inside a room full of people who came to feel something together. The stage and the canvas are asking the same question. How do we make the invisible visible?
As Seen In
Yahoo Finance named me “World Famous DJ and Singer MoniKa Starling” — I’ll let that line do its own work.
Come In
Everything here was made for you to find, keep, and return to.
— MoniKa
Start Here
Shop Original Art · Shop Prints from $15 · Listen to MoniKa on Spotify
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