STAR"TISTS SPRING FLOWERS ISSUE | Page 102

STAR: How did you become a painter? GALINA.S: I guess thanks to my mother’s encouragement She handed me a pencil when I was just one year old. I can’t remember this fact, but she told that everybody around accused her that a child may hurt her eyes. Well, the consequences were heavier, not for eyes, but for the family - the child became an artist... STAR: Can you remember you first commission like a painter? GALINA.S: If to speak about the first one, - it was also due to my grandmother. One time she proposed me to paint some different flowers on the kitchen wall every day seems I was over 6-7y.old... yes, I had a lot of freedom in child time... But on the professional level, the first commission was just after I graduat- ed from the art college, it was some Maurer with autumn landscape over 5-6 meters in length. STAR: Is anyone in your family a professional painter? GALINA.S: No, it was not like any art school methods either. In my early childhood, they read to me lot of books and then I learned to draw something from this narrative. Especially my grandmoth- er, a school teacher herself would guide me.I used to ask her to tell me some new fairytale, every- day...seems like she never refused me... And this fantastic world is visualized and later it turned to be my passion ... at first, it was just color pencils and felt-tip pens, then I moved to watercolor. 102