One way or another, I have been drawing all my life in whatever circumstances I was. I am grateful to my father, who, being an artist, gave me an excellent academic base. He said that the painting lives on strokes. The strokes give the painting a liveliness and individuality, and I try to follow this in my work. I paint by oil on canvas, sometimes on paper. Every time I paint, I feel excited, comparable to the feeling of falling in love. With all my heart I love landscape painting and find inspiration wherever I am. I travel a lot: I celebrated the New Year in a tent in the northernmost point of Europe in Norway, I saw the aurora in Finland, I went iceskating on the world's largest lake Baikal, I climbed the Alps in Switzerland, Austria, France and Italy, I went kayaking along the Dutch rivers and canals, went on an autonomous 3-week trip to the Putorana Plateau and was in a thousand other beautiful places. Wherever I am, I see beauty everywhere.