colours of a restless mind

Reading time: approx. 2 min

As the title suggests, this work is a prolonged snapshot of a restless mind. Naturally, as is so often the case with artists, it is about my own mind, or simply about the various aspects of being human.

For some time now, painting has become a vital anchor for me in terms of nervous system regulation. It helps me to regulate and re-center myself, supporting my body during an important phase of healing without having to strive for it or force it. It simply happens—and evidently, it has been happening for years without me even realizing it.

However, I feel that this aspect has taken a back seat since I began working digitally. I don't experience the same sense of regulation there as I do with analogue painting on canvas, paper, or walls. Perhaps that is where the feeling of being creatively drained for several years stems from. Maybe you know the feeling yourself: when a passion suddenly means more 'suffering' than 'creating.' When something that is supposed to be good for you slowly changes until it is no longer the same.

Since I began exploring the nervous system and the limbic system more intensely, I have noticed how vastly different aspects emerge during the process of regulatory painting. "Colours of a Restless Mind" evolved over several weeks, created exclusively on days when I wasn't feeling well. Days when I was gnawing on a thought or disregarding my own boundaries. Each time, I unconsciously reached for this canvas to continue working. It is only now, with the piece finished, that I understand how it helped me intentionally project that inner restlessness outward. A transformation into color and form.

The longer I look at it now, the more joy and appreciation I feel for it. For a long time, I found it absolutely terrible, seeing only a heavy, illogical interplay on the canvas. But that is not what it is. It is alive, seeking its own path toward the light at the end of the tunnel. Within this carousel of thoughts, the painting still guides the eyes with intention across the fabric.

It bears witness to a dynamic inner dialogue. It reflects a centering that, in my view, is never geometrically clear, but rather a constant state of growth and change. The work allows opposites to stand side by side, however illogical they may seem and however little they fit the harmonious image one tends to hold of oneself.

Having fulfilled its purpose of reflection, the work can now exist as an aesthetic object. An object of pure, imperfect dialogue with a restless mind, reflecting the beauty and strength of that very process.

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