Never Give Up on your Dream

You will love shopping at KhaliNoveau's Etsy Shop http://www.etsy.com/shop/KhaliNouveau where she has many wonderful treaures. I fell in love with her little birds. Have fun exploring!

by KhaliNouveau

My name is Aiysha Khaalid, nickname Khali, I am a full-time artist with a bachelor degree in Fine Arts. I'm a painter, an illustrator, a mixed media artist, and crafter. I am the owner and creator of the Etsy shop called KhaliNouveau. The name of my business is a combination of "Khali, a nickname given from my family and "Nouveau", French for ‘New’ inspired from the most famous and my favorite art period, Art Nouveau.

Creativity has been in my blood since an early age. I have been an artist for over 15 years. What inspires me to become an artist is my love of art, and artworks by Frida Kahlo, Gustav Klimt, and newly discovered Hayv Kahraman because of their original artistic style and feminine beauty in their work. Their use of details, strong symbolism, and strong composition in their artwork affects my creative energy into making my own style.

As an artist I like to experiment with all kinds of materials and mediums but I mostly feel comfortable with a few. My base mediums I like to work with are acrylic paints and graphite pencil on smooth surfaces such as canvas and printmaking paper. These are my personal choice because honestly, I fail horribly in watercolors, and oil paints are quite messy and difficult to work with. I have no special technique or process that makes my artwork unique. I do re-sketch my ideas often. Some people assume as an artist, I am artistically adapted to any art style like great masterpieces to computer graphic design. But I only limit myself to what I do best and my expertise is painting in my own way and I do not mimic another artist’s technique.

My greatest accomplishment thus far has been working at an established art gallery in Dubai. I always wanted to work at an art gallery and did not expect to be living and working that dream in the Middle East. I gained so much insight on the art world and it’s a lot of work helping to run an art gallery. Ten years from now I see myself teaching art again and owning an art gallery. If I had to give one advice for new artists, I would say that don’t be afraid to fail or make mistakes, that’s part of the learning process as an artist. So never give up on a dream or something that you are passionate about.
 
 

Sandra Darling

http://www.SandraDarling.etsy.com/
http://www.sandradarlingvisualartcreations.com/

by SandraDarling

My background and training as a visual artist came from not only "a good art school education" but the greatest teacher of all - Life! I grew up in North Queensland which is both coastal and tropical; a precious and unique place where the rainforests meets the sea. It provided me with a rich tapestry of geographical as well as social exposure, and gave me my foundation as a young adult discovering my place in the world. I originally trained as a painter but I have always had an interest in all art forms and I expanded my canvas (literally and metaphysically) to beyond this medium. Since then, travelling to Europe, Asia and across Australia has enriched my outlook of the world and people around me.

It was from here that I found my platform for a visual language that has led me on the journey that has bought me to where I am currently at today. Through my art work, images rich in layers and textures, I explore all that is intrinsically human and in particular feminine. The quote "the present is just a moment passed" sums up our fragile and changing existence and I think it also gives a glimpse into the world of what my art work explores.

My Art has always investigated issues of the psyche and how we portray and protect ourselves through layering and masking our true inner self as a means of adapting and protecting our wellbeing in the world and environment around us. As well as this, how we make our mark on an ever-changing and transient world, through our habits of memento; a vehicle of grasping time, place and proof of our existence, methods of remembering and establishing our collective heritage. Being an avid collector myself, I enjoy researching to discover the origins of objects and their history and then apply this knowledge to contextualise my own work.

My influences are first and foremost everything I see, feel and experience, but I've always had a great love of the Decorative Arts and Crafts; the Art Nouveau and Art Deco period; the great 20th Century Artists; and I have a great admiration for the artists of the Renaissance period, my favourite from this period probably being Botticelli where images of mythology and flora are in abundance.

I see myself as a bit of a Bowerbird (distracted by “sparkly things” since 1968) picking and choosing what applies to me.

My best advice for anyone looking to buy art as an investment is to buy what you love, because a happy heart is the best investment you can make, and the eyes are the window to your happy heart. Immerse yourself in what pleases you whenever your can as I personally believe that it is the journey and not the destination that is the so called meaning of life in this crazy world!