Julia Mon

When I was a baby, my mother used to lull me to sleep standing in front of the refrigerator. In the darkness of the room, the small green light on its door felt like a miracle, quietly hypnotising me into sleep. Since then, light—whether in fairy lights, street lamps, or the glow of a sunset—has remained inseparable from my sense of safety, comfort, and home.

Through my paintings, I seek to preserve the moments, places, and feelings that have shaped my sense of home. Rooted in nostalgia and memory, my work draws from personal experiences, childhood impressions, and the emotional traces left behind by time. I am drawn to fleeting moments that linger long after they have passed: the warmth of a summer evening, a home illuminated after sunset, empty streets layered with memory, where echoes of human life are felt rather than seen, or the quiet presence of someone deeply loved.

Many of these memories go back to childhood trips with my family to the Ukrainian coast. As war and displacement transformed the landscapes of my past, painting became a way to preserve and reconstruct a beloved world that no longer exists in the same form.

Working primarily in oil, I create luminous spaces suspended between memory and imagination. Painting a...

Kharkiv National University of Arts