Interview

Written By Adelé Kotzé

Donna Kryszak

Donna is an oil paint and acrylic abstract painter for over 25 years. She utilises various depths and colours in her art bringing about a sense of obscurity and depth, while combining oddness. Her art has also previously been displayed at a gallery in Florida as well as published in a local magazine. Donna enjoys creating the different, while experimenting with new mediums and design. Sophistication with abstract oddities. No AI involved. These are all original designs where she loves creating these unique one-of-a-kind pieces, putting her very heart and soul, feelings and emotions into the art she creates. She wants to be able to bring color to the lives of others into and to continue to inspire others.

 

What is your background and how did you start your journey in the art world?

“Let me start by saying I've always had a love of art. In school, we had art classes that we could take as an elective and art has always provided me outlet of release if you will to be able to express my feelings emotions and creative expression. Having been oil and acrylic painter and digital graphic designer for over 25 years, I really enjoy doing abstract work. And how I started the journey back into the art was my husband is a travelling ultrasound tech and we ended up staying in a town called Fargo in North Dakota. It was there that my creative floodgates were open so to speak I was so inspired by this town by the city, and I just felt the need to just be so creative again and I knew that this was something that I wanted to get back into and make more of not just a career but a personal journey. I want to be able to share my art with the world.”

What inspires you?

“There is a lot that inspires me, my faith in God inspires me, my family inspires me, and I love color, color inspires me, and travel inspires me. I love to color my world and I want to be able to color other people's worlds as well. And also, I'm a huge fan of Bob Ross I grew up watching him painting and he always was very positive person and stated “there are no mistakes just happy accidents” and “it's your world” and that has helped me tremendously. I also like different and odd work. I'm also inspired by Salvador Dali.”

What themes do you pursue? Is there an underlying message in your work?

“Yes, most definitely yes. My paintings, I like a sense of balance in my art that is very clean, structured and different. I love colors I love shapes I like to combine oil and acrylic together a lot of other artists say that doesn't work you can't do that together; you can. I love to break the rules when it comes to my art my themes are abstract my themes are colorful my themes are movement different. My art, you can literally take a piece of my art and rather than just look at it one way you can turn it around do a 360° view and my art will look different from each and every angle there's no specific top or bottom right to left it's left to right up or down whichever way you want to view it and that's what I love about my art is it's so different. I want the beholder to be able to have a piece of art that they can also relate with and it's not boring and you can view it anywhere you want, and you can put it up in your house or gallery any way you want there's no right or wrong way to hang my art. My goal is to have the buyer the beholder sees something different every time they look at my art it's an experience it's a feeling it's an emotion it triggers a memory for them that's what I want. I want the beholder to be able to connect and be able to relate to it.”

How would you describe your work?

“How I would describe my work is abstract colorful different. I like texture. I like breaking the rules combining acrylic and oil mediums together. My work is - you can hang it up and look at it top to bottom, or you can turn it and look at it left to right, and it looks different each angle. I create different images in the artwork and the paintings. Every time you look at the art, you'll never see the same thing twice I like to do bold expressionism different colorful. I like art that stands out and that's what I try to create. Monochromatic meets abstract.”

Which artists influence you most?

“I like this question, there are several artists that influenced me the most the first one is no other than Bob Ross the second is Salvador Dali the third is Monet and the 4th is Picasso. I find their work to be fascinating and each one has their own flavor if you will of style of art and I grew up appreciating the different art. Also, I admire Wyland and guy Harvey, I've never been one to be able to create realistic paintings, but they are an inspiration in their own right.”

“There is a lot that inspires me, my faith in God inspires me, my family inspires me, and I love color, color inspires me, and travel inspires me.”

What is your creative process like?

“Every now and again you can have a creative block. How do I get past the creative block is by focusing on the art putting the stress aside and just picking up my brush and my tools and going and focusing on the new piece that I want to put out to the world and it's channeling my faith channeling my inner being and applying that as the creative process to overcome the challenges and blocks of everyday life. And in turn I take that energy and instead of using it to worry using it to fuel anxiety I instead use that energy to create a one-of-a-kind masterpiece.”

What is an artist’s role in society and how do you see that evolving?

“An artist plays a very important role in society especially today. We have the ability to be able to bring about peace with our work whether that be politically whether that be faithfully we have that ability to use our God-given talents as a creative outlet and a means to inspire others to use a memorial of others to bring about a better world by giving the world a piece of ourselves to make this place a better place to live. And how I see the art evolving is we in my personal professional opinion the art needs to stay true to the artist meaning the old school way of painting spray painting utilizing different mediums has to come from the heart and understandably we live in an age where artificial intelligence is being utilized to take over certain aspects of the art industry however in my professional opinion it takes away and steals what a human can do and if we do away with that human element the art will just be pretty things to look at. It will contain no meaning no purpose. However, when a human being creates art that's a piece of themselves that's a piece of your soul that's a piece of your heart that's your inner being that you are expressing to the world trying to make the world a better place with your creativity.”

Have you had any noteworthy exhibitions you'd like to share?

“Many years ago, when I was in high school my art was featured at the local Art Museum downtown Lakeland FL regrettably I do not have a picture of that. But God willing I'll be able to have a lot more to share.”

 
Adelé Kotzé
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