I continue to tell stories of creating my paintings.

I will not speak for all artists, but in my case, the picture is born when a critical mass of internal thoughts and images has accumulated, coinciding with each other and something serves as a trigger for their compilation into a single one, its own last element of the mosaic.

"Narwhals", 70x70cm, 2017

In my head were fragments of a book on the evolution of medieval aesthetics by Umberto Eco, where he describes the allegories of what animals serve on medieval miniatures, trellises and facades of Gothic cathedrals. A special place in them was occupied by the image of a unicorn.

I move in an environment of innovative startups, in which the image of a unicorn is associated with a company whose capitalization in a short period exceeded $1 billion.

I remember how mesmerized I was by the Gothic stained glass Windows when I first came to the chapel of Saint-Chapelle. How the sunlight was refracted and gently dispersed. Or when you dive into the sea to a great depth and look up at the rays of light.

The trigger for combining all these images was a visit to the paleontological Museum. In addition to the exhibits, there are absolutely unique ceramic panels throughout the Museum that illustrate ancient organisms. But the most memorable was the two-floors evolutionary panel, where images of narwhals were woven into a composition of animals and plants. And then I thought: "Here they are, my real Arctic unicorns, heroes of Inuit fairy tales and legends»