Biography
"Come to the edge, he said. They said: We are afraid.
Come to the edge, he said.
They came.
He pushed them and they flew."
(Guillaume Apollinaire, 1880-1918)
During my life I have been on a very long journey to reach the point I am at now to have the opportunity to be an artist and do what I love most in my life. It would take time long enough to write a book to describe all of my experiences, and maybe one day I will do this. Maybe, I am already doing it within my paintings.
Art takes such a big part of my life that I would say it is my life. Painting is like breathing for me, something that is vital, absolutely essential for me. Art has totally changed my life, when in October of 2005 I started to study at the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in London, where I arrived from a little Russian town in the Ural’s Mountains area.
I had absolutely different life in my little town and if somebody would have told me in 2005, that in three years I will have successfully completed Masters Degree in Fine Art at the University of the Arts London and will be exhibiting my paintings in London, New York, Miami, Venice etc., that in 2010 I will become a member of the Society of Women Artists in the UK and that my paintings will have been selected to exhibit in a Dream Place for any artists – at the world-famous Saatchi Gallery - I would never believe in it. I would probably consider them to be totally insane or at least to be joking.
At that point I was with my only and adorable son in a whole world, without any relatives and with a totally frustrated life as a package. It was an incredibly hard time for me; I was slowly, hardly and painfully recovering from losing in a tragic car accident my Mum, who was my best Friend, Teacher and a Source of Wisdom and entire Kindness. The pain is still here...I could not reconcile to this loss for so long time that it was cause for some health problems. Then later I lost my brother to cancer. Then I went through a long and depressive divorce procedure with my ex-husband with whom I had been married for 19 years. At times I felt so much of loneliness and hopelessness that it was almost unbearable - I literally could not breathe because of the pain inside.
How I overcame it all is a long, long story...For years I was not even able to talk about my past with anybody, it was too painful for me. And also I always thought that it was a shame to load your pain on the shoulders of others. I thought it was a shame to confess that you have lost any meaning and sense of your life, it was a shame to suddenly realize that you live with a feeling that you have almost wasted the only life given to you. I don’t know how I would have lived now and what my life would be like, if at some point I would not have felt that my life cannot be like this anymore and that I have to change it to have a chance to be eventually happy.
And now, I am ready to share my life story with others, especially with those who are at a desperate point and are about to lose their last hope and belief in themselves. I can tell now that everything is in our hands and it is never too late to change your only life for the better. I want to believe if I did it - somebody else can do.
Before to continue, I want to tell you a little story from my childhood, which I believe, has influenced my whole life. I was born in the Far North of Russia, which is closer to Alaska than to Moscow, and for the first four years of my life I saw only endless white fields of polar snow around me. When I was 4 years old, I moved with my Mum to the one of the most beautiful parts of Russia – the Urals’ Mountains area. I remember very clearly the morning, when I woke up and saw flowers the first time in my life. Being a small child, and having only ever seen the whiteness of snow before, I couldn’t imagine how colourful the world around me can be.
I was almost shocked by the colours of flowers and their beauty. This amazing feeling of admiration of nature is still deep inside me. I remember the fear of that little girl, who had only just discovered all of this beauty, that it might disappear from my life and tomorrow I would see the only white of the snow instead of the flowers once again. I felt at that moment the strongest desire to save the beauty of the world in my life forever. I believe it was the moment when the Artist inside me was born.
Following this experience in my life, when I started to explore painting, of course, the first subjects were images of flowers and leaves. Painting was my passion from the very childhood and as far back as I can remember I painted everywhere I could find a spare place - on walls, on furniture and on doors, on clothes and even in lesson books at school. Later on I begun to experiment with painting on silk because I felt the surface of silk is similar to the surface of flowers' petals - soft, silky and warm. Then there followed numerous experiments in different media and styles.
Whatever I was doing in my life, I always wanted to be an artist. I used to study at Music College as a chorus conductor, I sang in a rock-band and wrote songs and lyrics, I had my own fashion house for three years and worked as a window-designer - all of my activities were relative to art. I finished Art School in Russia with the Distinction Certificate and believe that Russian school of drawing and painting has a very big influence on me, as well as music and literature. The Art School provided me with some necessary basic artistic skills that were waiting for developing and improvement at the right time. I always worked in the fields related to art, but never had a time or opportunity to become a full-time professional painter. But then, in the beginning of 2005, I reached the point when nothing could stop me anymore, so I came to conclusion that The Right Time has arrived.
At this crossing point I decided to change my life completely and, as I had nothing to lose, I ventured to apply to a dream place to study for any artists - the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in London that is world known of its famous alumni such as Peter Doig, Anish Kapoor, Stella McCartney, Alexander McQuinn etc.
Despite of the fact that I could not speak any proper English (as I knew by that time only some basic words and phrases) and I had an interpreter to assist me during the interview, I was accepted for the studying with the requirement that I have to learn English and pass the necessary for the international students English Language exam. I hadn’t a clue if it was possible to study English up to this level for such a short period of time, but I wanted to study so much that I had no choice, but to learn, and in 7 months I passed my exam. In October of 2005 I began my studying at the Central Saint Martins College, being probably the oldest, but certainly the happiest student on my course.
Then BA followed, then I applied for MA course at the Chelsea College of Art and in the end of 2008 I have successfully completed my education at the University of the Arts London with Masters Degree in Fine Art. I am a full-time artist now and work at my studio in the very heart of London. I am constantly exhibiting my works around the UK, in USA and in Europe having achieved a few international Painting Prizes and Awards. I work every day on my paintings, and sometimes it is a hard, but a happy work.
Art gave me Hope, Inspiration and Energy to cope with all of my circumstances. Art helped me to bring my life back. I believe that nothing is too late in this life, nothing is impossible and unachievable. There is always a possibility to go forward to approach your dream and never give up, never surrender. Life is a wonderful gift to appreciate and to live it to the full while we have it...
Though my paintings take most of my time, aside from my work I enjoy music, from classical to rock, roller-skating, swimming and walking in a country side or anywhere by the sea. I am a Cossack and love riding horses. I believe that loving horses is genetically germinated in me through the generations of Cossacks as well as loving Freedom. I do enjoy reading and learning foreign languages.
I love exploring mysterious places such as the Egyptian Pyramids and often have my own theories about any kind of mysteries and enigmatic phenomenon. I enjoy travelling and would love to travel the world as much as possible. I'd love to visit enigmatic places such as the temple complex of Baalbek in Lebanon, the ancient Mayan city of Palenque and the ancient city of Teotihuacan in Mexico, also the Inca archaeological site Ollantaytambo, Nasca Desert in Peru and also a place suggested by one of my fb friends as 'the most magical spot on this globe' - Oaxaca in Mexico... There are so many places on the Earth I would love to see - the list is endless...
I believe that we all create the World around us within our energy and I do believe in the Power of the Universe.
