I was born on Christmas Day in Sofia, Bulgaria, and my life since then has unfolded across continents. My family’s migrations — first to Johannesburg, then back to Bulgaria, and finally to Cape Town — shaped the way I see the world: always attentive to atmosphere, always searching for the small, luminous moments hidden in the everyday.

Though I studied Fine Art at the University of Cape Town and Visual Arts at UNISA, my real artistic education happened outside the classroom. The academic environment often dismissed my work as “too traditional,” and for a time I stepped away from painting. In that quiet distance, photography found me. Through the lens I learned to look again — to notice how light transforms an ordinary scene, how a fleeting impression becomes a story if you stand in the right place.

Photography rekindled my creative spark and eventually led me to complete a Drawing and Painting Diploma with the London Art College, helping me rebuild both skill and confidence. Today, painting and photography sit side by side in my practice, each feeding the other.

I work primarily in acrylics, especially while travelling. Their immediacy suits my instinctive process: I rarely sketch beforehand. Instead, I follow emotional memory — the feeling of the moment that first moved me — blending photographs with the impressions and sensations that linger long after the shutter closes.

Most of my paintings are small in scale. I love the intimacy of artworks that draw the viewer close, close enough to see the brushstrokes, the texture, the breath of the image. Small works invite a kind of quiet attention that mirrors the way I experience the world.

My influences range from the Impressionists and the bold colour of the Fauves to contemporary artists like Nicholas Verrall and Laurent Parcelier. What unites them — and what guides me — is a fascination with light: its honesty, its magic, its ability to transform the ordinary into something quietly extraordinary.

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