ISRAEL’S OWN ELENA KOTLIARKER
In my work, I make my utmost effort to bring forward the abundant beauty and splendour that is withheld in the Judaic Art. In my method, I do this by embedding the numerous Jewish symbols and icons that have developed throughout many centuries of our rich history and heritage. The symbols mainly identify signs of fortune from the Kabbalah like good health, prosperity, fertility and so on. I believe that when a person stares at the picture and detects the signs, good fortune will come upon him or her!
Elena, thank you so much for participating in this project and answering for us the following questions:
1) What is art to you?
Imagine you enter a restaurant or a jewellery store… Try to recall that thrilling sensation when an exotic dish or a fascinating luxurious piece of jewellery takes you in and makes you forget about all other business. You feel an urge to grab it, taste it, merge with it… My opinion: that art (painting in my case) is a way to reproduce such sensations and to pass forward the evolving vibrations.
2) What inspires you?
First of all, it is my strong feeling for the nature of Israel – its rich GARDEN and its blooming and colourful flowery palette…
This garden is rich in symbolic forms that are meaningful for Judaism as well as for other religions …
In fact, I am inspired by sophisticated surfaces created by nature, such as the multi-layered surface of minerals, or the play of light in pearls…
Minerals provide me with a lot of warmth, their touch causing a pleasant sensation inside that urges to create. So I place them around the candles,
sprinkle them with aromatic oils and they help me enter my canvas door into a fairy tale world. Once there, I might pick up one of the stones,
study its texture and think of its powers and impact on people.
Our life is a great salad, and Israel is one mixture combining the contrasting and yet complementary ingredients of East and West.
Very often I get inspired by old decorative objects of different peoples: from ancient Oriental murals to Russian Matryoshka dolls…
And there are no frames dividing between my works – they are like transitions from one tale into another, free wondering in thought and space.
No wonder that people looking at my paintings raise associations of carpets. Some might desire to start a journey on a fairy-tale flying carpet that
would swoop them away from their reality, while others might wish such a colourful carpet would bring them prosperity and warmth, help them stand
with both feet on the ground…
3) When you are in the process of creating, painting, where does it take you? What I mean is where does your mind travel?
First of all, Carlos Castaneda is one of my favourite authors. The acceptance of possibility of mind traveling and images and symbols, which are coming with the dreams, is one of most important parts of my paintings. Sometimes, while working, I have physical vibrations coming right from my stomach. It’s usually until I reach that stage that I keep searching and repainting, while this precious vibration announces that the real work has started. The image produced at that vibration time is usually full of contrasts, a sharp and unpleasant conglomerate, which I strive to balance afterwards by filling in the lacquers and glazing, creating half-tones and subtle color transitions. The resulting variety combines opaque as well as glowing lacquers.
4) Do you think visual art, music and health are related, and if so, please elaborate?
Visual art and music from my point of view are just different faces of the same coin. I believe, that music or visual art can drive human being from a state of complete calm to wild aggressiveness, and vice versa. So mental health and art and music can have very a strong relationship. As far as physical health – I can’t be convinced. But I think, that any creative human being who likes what he’s doing, is always healthier than someone who is idle or the man who is always doing
something under stress and without love.
5) How do you feel when you are painting?
The painting process is a place where I am totally alone, totally free, and neither of whom are describable.
6) Do you identify with your subject and on what level?
As usual I’m identifying myself with the flowers and fishes (by the horoscope I’m a “fish”). But I would say that it is more accurate to say I identify my paintings with my dreams and not with myself. Everyday life is much more prosaic and even mercantile compared with our dreams. Ask yourself, where you can see more vivid colors, in a dream or reality. For me, this answer is very clear.
7) When do you do your best work?
There are few conditions: The first and most important – when I’m alone at home so there are no interruptions
The second one is an atmosphere. The working atmosphere is never complete without music, mat or white coffee as background.
White coffee is a Yemenite drink containing ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg and pepper.
When hot, it spreads reviving and relaxing flavours, warming you from inside and filling you with positive energy.
And if I also rub some vanilla into my canvas, I paint in the” fresh cake” mood…
So here is a winning recipe for being creative:
One cup of good music mixed with 10 minutes of meditation,
5 sips of white coffee,
A couple of warm hugs with canvas,
And unlimited number of blessings…
8a) Does art help you connect with your “higher” self?
Please clarify what you mean by connect with your “higher self”?
8b) I mean by that, when you are painting, you know deep inside our mind, we all have a secret place or a space where nobody else can go, where we are very free, where everything is perfect and beautiful. A place where we truly feel we are a part of the whole universe. That’s what I mean by higher self.
From the first look the answer should be taken from the explanation, which is already provided by you. But I think, that the situation is more complicated.
Just want to explain, why I`m not sure, that the given explanation is mostly correct.
I can spread the visual artists into three groups:
– The pure artists, like Vincent van Gogh for example. The people, which are creating art only to free their emotions regardless of the fact whether people like it or not.
– The ones that are both great artists and also smart business men, like Salvador Dali for example.
– The commercially successful artists, that succeed in finding some special symbolic and/or line of colors, which is driving people to invest money, because after a few years the artwork price can grow x100 or even x1000. Again it is impossible to claim that they are not talented, but I think that it is easy to find the major difference between these groups.
Here is my answer. The real freedom comes only for people, which have nothing to loose.
Yes, I’m using a number of “stimulators”, like the literature, stones, aromas and spices, to “catch the wave” from the outside, but I really very SELDOM can touch these feelings from inside, because I’m not free enough to forget about the bunch of usual daily tasks.
I wish to feel these things much more often, but this does not depend only on myself. My answer may disappoint you a little bit, but I want to be as accurate as possible.
The link to my site:
http://www.elenakotliarker.com
Elena, it has been truly enlightening and I sincerely thank you. Until the next time, my friend from Israel, Shalom!
TO THE READER :
What does Elena’s art evoke in you?
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Lenochka, kakaya ty toschaya!!!
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