Tesa Drev, up-and-coming artist from Slovenia.Slovenian artist Tesa Drev, currently based in London, was born in Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia, northernmost of the former Yugoslav republics. After a childhood spent in Vienna, Austria, she returned to Slovenia after some seven years, to complete her schooling, but Austria and in particular Vienna, remained close to her heart at 18, she decided to venture back for her university studies. Having the advantage of being fluent in German, Tesa originally studied theatre and film at the University of Vienna. Although an interest in film has stayed with her, painting is where her real passion lies and after a few years in Vienna, Tesa was ready for a change of scene and a new challenge. London beckoned… “I’m the kind of person who likes to move all the time, I get bored easily (its not so much that i get bored, but i don`t want to get the feeling of comfort that would make me fall asleep)” Tesa says with a laugh, “and having visited London last spring I decided I wanted to live here.” Spending a year in London has provided fertile ground for artistic inspiration, as has falling in love, with the city itself, but also with a fellow Slovenian. It was, however, the desire to paint that first led Tesa to move to London and it’s here that she’s been able to explore her artistic ambitions more fully. “ I came here to discover, not just London, but other parts of myself. I was always painting, ever since I was a child, colourful paintings, probably what I would call abstract now,” she says laughing. Having started from a more abstract perspective, mainly focusing on colour, Tesa’s work is changing. “Colours can make really beautiful compositions, but there’s more to art than this. You can’t express everything with colour.” With art becoming freer, less structured and rigid, the combining of abstract painting, drawing, video, collage, photography is all possible and Tesa is not afraid of venturing into new territories. In fact, her background in film may well be put to good use in her art. With the need for a particular style diminishing, it’s much easier to express yourself more freely as an artist. “Despite a few detours, I always come back to painting”, she says with a smile and it seems she is finding her niche, without shying away from new innovations or becoming too set in her ways. She enjoys experimentation, opening doors introspectively and to the outside world. As a fairly solitary and introspective person, Tesa finds herself drawn to the tranquillity of painting as her main means of creative expression. Photography, film and art can all go hand in hand and Tesa is a woman of many interests and talents. During her time in London she’s being exhibiting her work in Bayswater, among the stalls and artists displaying their paintings along London’s Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens, with somewhat mixed emotions. “I originally started this as a way of making money and what I found interesting about the experience [of exhibiting and selling paintings in Hyde Park] was that most of the people who come there are just interested in looking at really simple paintings, rather than the more complicated (simple cliche art, its not so much about being complicated or not, because really good art can be indeed very simple), “ she says somewhat wistfully, with a hint of disillusion. “I felt that working this way was really working against my art, as it needs time and space to be appreciated.” How would she describe her own paintings? “My paintings (include both acrylics and watercolours) and up until recently they have mainly been abstracts or (abstract) landscapes. Many of my more recent ones have been inspired by the London industrial landscapes, which I find interesting – I’m fascinated by big cities. As well as paintings, I design my own greetings cards,” Tesa explains. In the future she aims to focus even more on urban landscapes and portraits in her work. She even has a mind to paint stress and in London she’s bound to have found the right place for that. Her working days are irregular with no day resembling the next. “When I start painting, it’s like I can’t really stop and I paint solidly for a week, making several paintings, then I don’t paint for two or three weeks, but do sketches, then I start painting again” she says. Living in a city though, provides many distractions and as in all creative pursuits, working towards achieving your creative potential and ambitions requires discipline and, to a certain extent, introspection and a keen focus on your vision. Has Slovenia as a country and her background been great influences to her as a painter, I ask her. “Definitely. With Slovenia being so small there is a sense of the country and Slovenian people not being recognised. In London lots of people have no idea about Slovenia and it’s often mistaken for Slovakia.” Although very positive about her nation and the special place it holds for her, Tesa is very much inspired by more international, contemporary painters and feels attracted to the more provocative and cutting-edge, something that has not yet reached as high a standard in Slovenia. Another reason for her move to London perhaps. “I admire artists like Tracey Emin, who are really expressing themselves, focusing on themselves and what they’re feeling. It’s harder to expose yourself than other people and I’m moving in this direction now. Towards something more provocative, expressing myself without caring what other people think, without self-censorship”, says Tesa. “When I’m painting I’m in a flow, I work with a feeling and dislike disruptions.” Tesa doesn’t want to compromise her art, a difficult position perhaps, but she remains positive. Although she feels her art would have died a dire death in Hyde Park, when I ask her where she feels it would flourish, she laughingly says “in solitude” and there’s a lot to be said for that. Skirting that difficult border between big city inspiration and the need for quiet reflection is a difficult position to be in and there is a certain fear and reluctance to settle. “I don’t really like this feeling of being at home anywhere,” Tesa says, “I don’t think this is really good creatively – this feeling that I’m really comfortable somewhere, then I just get lazy. It takes away the edge. Travel is good for painting, so many things happening – whether you want them to or not. And you meet new people; although I’m not naturally sociable, I can be if “pushed”. I always like a new challenge, that’s why I came here.” Despite leaving her home and family at a young age, Tesa professes to needing a family, not necessarily blood relations, but people around her that matter, someone she really loves. “I feel at home wherever that person is,” she says. “I love Ljubljana, but I don’t want to live there right now, even though I always miss the place. Eventually I might end up living in a forest somewhere in Slovenia.” Sounds like a haven for painting to me. By Anna Maria Espsäter |
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