I am a former pianist, teacher, and library cataloguer. I have dreamed of becoming an artist whole life, but didn't have the time to commit to it fully as I was busy working and raising a family. But art was a constant obsession for me. I constantly drew sketches as a young child to pass the time during school, in lectures and in meetings. Five years ago, I started taking lessons from well-known Sydney artist and illustrator G. Veremeenko, who helped me overcome my fear of acrylic and oil painting. Once I tried oil, with its movable textures and stunning colours, I fell in love and never looked back. For the past few years, I has focused mainly on still lives, landscapes, the sea and flora and fauna, mainly in the style of realism. I have travelled overseas and around Australia, taking a lot of photos to use as inspiration for the paintings. During Australia's first wave of Covid-19, in isolation and quarantine, I focused on online tutorials, learning from artists from around the world, including Len Hend, Nadezhda Ilina, Dmitrii Roza and others. I took up painting full time since retirement in 2020.