On the importance of finding your own voice (or the longer version of the Artist’s Statement).

I’ve known pretty early on that visual arts and aesthetics run in my blood, espacially being subjected to it since childhood. My Father is a wonderful artist in his own right, even if he never went on to have a professional career, and I was always fascinated with his many supplies, his collection of educational materials, how he could bring birds and animals to life with a few precise pencil lines, and the very process of his creating beautiful paintings, which he would then gift away. Eventually he stopped painting and this is probably the saddest thing I had to witness back then.

In my early adulthood, due to trials and tribulations my life has dragged me through, I have avoided the topic of art altogether for far too long. Today I can hardly believe how suppressed my creativity was and how long it waited to burst into the open. In the end I only discovered how many different masks it had to wear for me to let it live in some obscure corner of my mind. But eventually, in the summer of my life (because life only starts after 40), I have let this little voice inside me speak. And it spoke of lush watercolour washes and how the colour binds with water to create amazing and unsuspected shapes and patterns. My controlling mind always remains a bit frustrated at all this colourful unpredictability but is also fascinated with it to no end. I know I chose the right medium to always keep me on my toes and never take it for granted. And that’s what’s important in every relationship.

Let’s be honest, I struggle. I wish I had the guts to just casually go out there and say “look at me now”. It took me long enough to emerge from the depths of my tiny atelier and I am still soft like a newly molted crab. But I think, perhaps on some deeper level, every artist struggles. We’re never quite right there, where we want to be, there’s always something more to learn, to try, to experiment with and the feeling of your bottomless thirst for perfection, never being quenched, forever remains. Or maybe that’s just me? I find inspiration in so many different styles and art movements, one life would never be enough to delve into. My philosophy of Art on any given day can be voiced as a strong postmodernist statement. However, there is another wolf in me. And she’s painfully formalistic, especially when it comes to my own work. I instinctually feel my compositions and my colour schemes and I can mix and match to my soul’s content, but whenever my technique fails me, it is the end of the world and everything good in it for me. Believe me, I have buried my career a million times over. This is why I eagerly try out new things and try to weave new techniques and new perspectives into my work. Simply speaking, I feed my wolves with what I want them to eat, and not let those picky eaters walk all over me.

Do I have a style of my own? Unfortunately, I seem to. I have my own signature line and I have my own brush stroke, and our relationship is quite turbulent. I’m unsure whether I should make peace with it or keep confronting it. It’s like having your own unruly teenager, living rent free in your mind, trying to instill his own rules for the entire household. It may just be due to my infancy as an artist and I certainly have a lot of maturing to do before I step into my adult artist shoes. And the beauty of it all is that I still dont know wehere I will end up. Perhaps one day I’ll simply outgrow the influences I’m under and leave them like a coccoon. I may still grow into something bold, something that for now just pulls the strings of my mind in funny directions when I think about it.