Michelle Barber meets an artist whose paintings invite exploration but who dislikes explanation because it leads her further away from her connection to her audience.
Ingrid Berzins’ whimsical paintings capture a sense of wonder with the details of our natural surroundings. Every painting by Ingrid includes a source of light and I make it a goal to find it in every painting of hers that I see. Her collaboration with Daisyland at their shared Ostend Gallery in Surfdale brings a welcomed art space to the area.
Michelle Barber: What’s your background?
Ingrid Berzins: I have been making art since I was very young. When other children were outside playing, I would often be in my room making posters (Basil Brush) or making Christmas presents for my family, a process which started early in the year. I loved all forms of creativity, writing with an ink pen and perfecting letterforms.
To me words looked beautiful.
When it comes to crafts, painting and clay, my mother is a ceramicist, as was my grandfather when in Latvia. They were both painters as well. My grandfather was well known in the capital city Riga, and the prime minister at the time owned several of his works.
My father made leather items embossed with Latvian motifs and my brother has taken the moving image path and become a cameraman. Because I come from a creative family, art as a career path was accepted and encouraged so it was an expected path for me to follow and since my family escaped from Latvia and arrived in New Zealand as refugees. Freedom was highly valued and so were my choices.
