To begin with, tell us about the highlights of your journey. What were the defining steps that brought you to where you are today?
Right now I paint, draw, sew and make illustrations from my small studio in Pagrati, in Athens. I’ve had this space for just over four years and before that I worked from an even smaller studio at home. Until our daughter was born I mainly painted murals, so perhaps the first defining step, working backwards, was her arrival 11 years ago, as it marked the beginning of my career painting canvases.
The mural painting began at another important time, when I was still working as an architect. I had painted a wintery-themed mural in our apartment as a backdrop to a Christmas dinner party we were throwing. A guest liked it and wanted something similar in her house, and that was more or less the beginning of the end of my architectural career!
The move to Greece is of course a majorly defining moment for me, even though at the time I had no idea what it would lead to! My husband and I met in London studying architecture, just a few months before he moved back to Greece to set up his architecture firm. Four years later – having completed my masters – I followed.
My decision to study architecture was another key moment, and one that surprised my family and friends and even me! I was doing an art foundation year at art school and a tutor suggested I look into it, and I loved how it seemed to combine creativity and imagination with a sense of order and measure. My years in London studying and working were so much fun and introduced me to my best friends, and most inspiring teachers.
In what ways do you feel your aesthetic has evolved, and what do you consider to be your most important achievements so far?
Since that first mural my style has evolved considerably. The early murals were hyper-realistic depictions of scenes of city life – street markets and cafes for example, drawn in white chalk on black painted walls. I resisted colour for ages but gradually started to work up to using coloured pencils, inks, and eventually paint. When my daughter was born I shifted into illustrative work for branding and identity projects, collaborating with the graphic designer Domnika Grigoriadi. And when I first started painting I was using watercolours and making very detailed botanically-themed work, which I exhibited in the UK.
This led me to a collaboration with a close friend to design fabric prints for her swimwear company, MAAN. The shift to abstract work was difficult, but it was something that I longed for. I felt myself slowly relaxing and opening up to instinct and chance, letting go of the control I had always worked with until then. I made many studies – most of them now hidden away! – and in 2020 I was given my first commission, for a private house in Mykonos, which a very exciting moment. Since then I’ve worked primarily by commission, but have also exhibited collections in solo exhibitions at the Dexamenes Hotel in 2021, and the Kalesma Hotel in 2022. I’ve also taken part in several group exhibitions, including Art Athina in 2025 with the Nitra Gallery.
What does your most recent work involve, and what do you enjoy creating the most?
My most recent work has been quite loose compared to older work. It’s evolving in different ways but I’ve noticed that instinctively I’m trying to make it simpler, clearer and cleaner somehow. I’m looking for clarity and I’m breaking the layers down. I’m working with thinner, more diluted layers of paint and taking my time to see what happens when they meet and how they interact.
My paintings have always been about finding a sense of balance and whereas before I would set the challenge in the base layers and then just work fast and instinctively for as long as it took until I sensed the balanced solution was there, now I’m really trying hard to introduce a tiny bit of restraint in how I achieve the balance, but without restricting the creative process. This is actually really hard, it requires a lot of practice, and I’m definitely not there yet. It’s amazing how much harder it is to do less!
How have your creativity and the exceptional outcomes of your work shaped you as a person? What have you gained through the creative process?
Working creatively has always been my way to use the energy I have. I have always worked in creative fields, but when I moved away from the more structured architectural world and started working alone to make art it was quite a shock to the system, despite the fact that I wanted it and I made it happen for myself. After the initial period of elation at the freedom I now had, and the positive response I was getting I started to question the work I was making, if I actually liked it or felt connected to it. I didn’t really know what I wanted, I didn’t know how to let go of the need to control the process or how to start making work that made me happy rather than other people. I had to accept that I would make a lot of very horrible work in the beginning and just allow it to happen, keep going and not think about anything too much. That’s what led me to work in this very instinctive way, because the moment I started to think too much about it, I lost the energy that was pushing it forward. So it was clear to me that I had to just be brave and work, and stop worrying about it.
That was probably a bit of a reflection of what was going on in my life at the time — I had a small baby, I had no idea what I was doing, I was full of anxieties, and I just had to work with my instincts, worry less, not try to make everything perfect, and – if possible – enjoy it! So having these parallel situations was helpful, and I definitely grew as a person. My life informed my work and my work informed my life — it’s been back-and-forth in that way ever since. My work had to fit around my domestic situation, which meant it went in certain directions just out of practical necessity, but then whenever I had the opportunity to expand it and take a bit more space for myself, I took it. As my daughter has grown and become more independent, so my work has evolved — it’s felt like an organic relationship between the two. I’ve gained a lot of self-knowledge through both of these situations, allowing them to exist symbiotically.
Do you love color, and how do you approach it within your work?
I really love color. I came from the more monochrome world of studying and working in architecture a little bit afraid of how to approach colour and I resisted it for a long time, despite several clients trying to persuade me that I should add a little to my murals! I tried adding little highlights here and there but it was my botanical illustration work that helped me break through my barrier, and studying the work of colour magicians such as Mabel Royds and Jef Bourgeau, and later abstract artists such as Deborah Tarr and Helen Frankenthaler. I started to see how tones within colours brought new depths to the overall effect of a painting and created the play of light and dark that I enjoyed in monochrome sometimes even more effectively. I became more colorful as a person as I rooted myself in my life in Greece and my work as an artist.
What inspires you to keep evolving creatively? Tell us a story behind a moment or experience that shaped your process.
Inspiration comes organically and I go through phases of feeling very inspired by everything and quieter periods where it doesn’t come so naturally to paint. I try to let this ebb and flow of creative energy be, I can’t really force myself to make work. That’s one of the reasons why I like to keep some variety in my studio and have other projects in the background. Illustration commissions for example, and also sewing. I have a sewing studio below my painting studio, and working down there on small, simple personal projects is very therapeutic. But I never fail to feel inspired when I’m spending time in natural landscapes. I don’t think I could ever get tired of finding new places to visit and experiencing the incredible natural beauty of Greece. The light is constantly inspiring me, and although I might not have one specific moment that has shaped my process, I can think of 1 million tiny moments, usually to do with how the light plays on a landscape or the colour of the sky at certain times of the day, that stay in my mind’s eye whilst I’m working.
What are the non-negotiable values within your work?
The natural passage of time. I can’t be rushed! I feel like such a diva saying that, and it’s a huge contrast to how I used to feel about approaching my work, coming from the world of meeting deadlines for clients and providing a good service. It’s taken me ages to feel confident enough to set this boundary in my work, but the results are so clear to me. I might complete a large scale painting in a few weeks, if the inspiration is there, the energy is right and all the other logistical circumstances allow for that to happen. But it also might sit on my studio wall for a few months, waiting for the one last brush stroke that changes everything and completes the painting. Of course this is a luxurious way to work in many respects, and I still need to have a sense of scheduling underlying self-motivated work. But I’ve also been very lucky to have made commissioned work for some wonderful people who understand the process and give it space to breathe.
Name three places you love returning to, and why.
Home – wherever we travel to and even though we always want to move to wherever we go, the feeling of returning to our apartment in the center of Athens is the best feeling.
I love Aigina. I think it has a magical energy and perfect light. I feel so calm and peaceful there, from the moment I set foot on the dock.
My parents live in the middle of the Kentish countryside, and being there, immersed in the green is so therapeutic and inspiring…
Do you believe that art and creativity can make us better human beings?
Of course! Creativity exists in almost everything, it’s human nature. We are each of us uniquely creative, it’s just a matter of personal discovery. For some it’s a part of their identity from birth, for others it might be less obvious, but we are all creative one way or another even if we haven’t yet realized how. I think that artistic expression – through painting, sculpting, crafting, making music, writing or story-telling – is a way of making sense of the world and the human experience through our senses – sight, sound, touch. That’s why children are so good at it – they are discovering and learning about the world around them this way so it’s obvious to them.
Exposure to different creative perspectives and artistic interpretations of human experiences (such as birth, death, love, anger) opens our minds, makes us both more self-aware and more empathetic, and allows us to grow. Art can soothe, inspire, energise and provoke our emotions, and artists can remind us that there are as many ways of making sense of the world as there are people living in it.
