Escape the everyday world of things analyzed, understood and made purposeful and enter a place where softness, movement, color and freedom allow you to wander at will through both peaceful and turbulent journeys. Escape the known and enter the unknown. Escape adulthood and enter childhood. Become surprised through unpredictable discoveries and the unfolding of fantastic events.

All of this, without going anywhere: vacation into the inner self.

Painting can be a way out of defined reality, as each time a new world is created where things can happen unexpectedly, sparking mystery and curiosity. Painting a narrative: painting as writing. The watercolor medium, with its independent personality and unpredictable behavior, is the perfect means for this exploration.

No two watercolors can ever be exactly the same because one cannot control the movement of the water and the particles of color completely. In fact, it is the opposite of control. Painting watercolors entails a collaboration of the artist with a living medium. The act delicately clings to a state of mind that can allow for this collaboration to happen fruitfully.

“The painter’s business thus is not just to copy or imitate, but to give to the object something living in its own right.” -D.T. Suzuki, Zen and Japanese Culture

What can these paintings bring you? The discovery of something new everyday. The dream of a faraway journey not yet embarked upon. A newly found relationship with the natural world at a scale yet to be determined. Adventure.

Look closely, and observe the mixed miniscule bonds between colored particles, or stand back far away and become absorbed by a strangely balanced yet inviting landscape. Do faces appear out of the chaos of forms? Do shapes embrace each other only to turn disturbingly away a passage later?

Though seemingly abstract, these bio-organic shapes, influenced by an attraction to the natural world, are in fact very familiar. The hues - bright, intense, and descriptive - are highlighted observations of the everyday, processed and reassembled.

Providing directions of rest for our intangible emotions and yet unformed or incomplete thoughts, these are the stories of colors in shape. Look slowly and the narrative will take form.

“I started painting watercolors by chance and circumstance, not by choice. By choice I would have started with oils, since that is what I admired and had seen in person. I was introduced to watercolors in 1993, in a course on sketching architecture and streetscapes, while studying abroad in Denmark. We were given minimal direction and minimal pigments - only red, blue, and yellow - the primary colors, from which all other colors can be created. This taught me to explore, and to learn to mix new colors quickly, which, in painting watercolors, is absolutely necessary.

I also chose to start painting watercolors first because of cost. On a student (budget) trip to Latvia, I bought a very good set of Russian paints which lasted me 10 years. A little pigment can go a long way when you add water! I have also used the same brush I got in Denmark for almost 20 years (thought I bought a few others later on). All you really need for painting (and art in general) is imagination.”

Watercolors don’t allow for any mistakes - you cannot erase, you can only add - and as they dry fast, they don’t allow for much contemplation time. For this reason, besides imagination, what you need most to paint watercolors is to be in the right state of mind.