A Happy Excursion#4 Painting

My name is Ying Guo, a resident of St. John's, Newfoundland. As a painter, I believe that the works of art talk and that the artists should always leave a space for the audience to listen and interpret. Once completed, the works of art live on their own, often surviving longer than the artists themselves. I started painting when I was around six years old, enrolling in an ink painting class; painting sparrows, crabs and bamboo on rice paper, without first sketching, in a cultural center in my hometown, in China. From then on, I have carried on this technique of not having any sketch before painting. I have always loved the idea of water media, which brings slight 'surprises' and ‘accidents’ to the creation and introduces the unpredictable into an otherwise predictable result. Creating works of art is an indispensable part of my life, like the fresh air we breathe. Sometimes after finishing a painting, I feel that I have just had a lifelong conversation and have expressed what is otherwise hard to put into words. The natural elements in my paintings act as the interpretation of my thoughts, experiences, emotions and sometimes even conversations with strangers, which appear as the vagaries of brush strokes and colour borders. Deep in my heart, I instinctively feel that all of my paintings shown so far to the public and those that have never been shown are part of my personal, lifelong growth as an artist.