Strong Painting

I paint figuratively and I like to mix the nativistic with the realistic. Regardless if I'm painting humans or birds, both commonly reoccurring motivs in my paintings, it's always an atmosphere that is depicted. I seek a calm, a feeling, an atmosphere. In the gaze of the women in my paintings, a streak of melancholy seems to appear. Or maybe its longing. Birds have accompanied me throughout my artistic work. To me they symbolise an inner voice, someone to talk to, or just company. Maybe they whisper in my ear. Sometimes I want to listen, sometimes I don't. Maybe they are a part of me. It all started with blackbirds and self-portraits. They pulled my hair. We screamed at each other. They whispered in my ear. They made a nest in my hair. It was a struggle. Then I started paining other women and their birds. Other kinds of birds. What was their relationship to their birds? Their inner voices? Suddenly there were women that was half birds, and others that didn't have any birds at all. Where were their inner voices? Some made their own birds, shaped their own inner self. Some of the women had dead birds. Or where they just resting after a hard struggle? My current project is painting women with clenched fists. There is no strength in the fists, not necessarily in their gaze either. They are searching for an inner strength, to find their inner voice. In the gaze of the women in my paintings, a streak of melancholy seems to appear. Or maybe it’s longing. I call the series Fighters. They are just at the beginning of their fight. I want to let the viewer be a part of the storytelling. If I say to much the words may speek louder than the painting itself and then the mystery is lost.