Today we meet Simona Ruscheva, a graduate of Fine Art Painting from Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria who is currently living and working in London.

I had my first UK solo show “Transitions” in London, 2022 and my first international solo show “The source” at Keep Contemporary Gallery in Santa Fe, USA in 2021. I have participated in various international group shows and across London, including Royal Institute of British Artists Annual exhibition, where my work was Highly Commended by the De Laszlo Foundation, and Society of Women Artists Annual Exhibition.

I was longlisted in Jackson`s Painting Prize 2023 and Holly Bush Emerging Woman Painter Prize 2022 in the Portraiture category. I was also shortlisted for Kate Bryan art prize in July 2021 and for Artrooms Awards in 2019. 

I am a member of Contemporary British Portrait Painters. My works are also part of the global art collection of Standard Chartered Bank.

Your greatest inspirations or influences

My work is heavily influenced and inspired by Bulgarian folklore, rituals and mythology. I am very interested in the visual interpretation of various themes, such as cosmic creation, life cycle and natural elements. These include embroideries, weaving, ceramics, carpentry and many more material objects. 

Equally I draw a lot of inspiration from different rituals and traditions, especially the magic factor. I have a great interest in symbolism and mysticism, which is also interwoven in my works as an underlying subject.

I also take inspiration from the digital aesthetic, which forms a part of my visual language, such as gradients, soft vs sharp objects and colour palettes.

Tell us about your creative process Simona.

I usually lay out a few ideas as thumbnail sketches. I then do a photo shoot where I use them as a general guidance. That gives me a lot of reference material to use with the current ideas or new that are inspired by the photos. 

I then manipulate the images digitally until I am closest to my vision as I can go. Once I reach that point I start working on a canvas, and I do multiple works at once so I can switch between them when I need to. It also makes it easier to do a coherent body of work, rather than individual pieces. 

Do you have upcoming shows coming up?

I have a few group shows coming up in June that I am pretty excited about. I will be showing two new works at Eve Leibe Gallery at their new location in Turin, Italy opening on June 2nd. I will have works at D Contemporary in London in a group show opening on June 8th.  And lastly I will have a work at Open Gallery in Long Beach, CA, USA opening June 23rd.

I would love to know what’s been an interesting response you've heard in regards to your artworks.

While my works are very inspired by my Bulgarian heritage, they are not meant to be consumed by Bulgarian audience only. In fact I aim to reach more people, who are unaware of our culture and let them in the wonderfully rich world of symbols, motifs and colours. 

The most interesting responses have been exactly from such people, who are trying to pinpoint the origin of the works or notice details/parts of the works that are also present in different cultures, which all relates to the idea of the collective unconscious.

One such analogy I received as a response to my works was with the recurring threads in my works and the Norns, the Fate weavers from Norse mythology.

We love to ask, what does wellbeing mean to you?

I am grateful and happy for the life I have, my family, being able to create and make a living from it. But wellbeing for me is more of a rational choice rather than the result of various circumstances in my life. Wellbeing is being able to grown and learn in my work and as person. 

Anything else you would like to share?

Before I decided to pursue art in any form, I was studying at a mathematical high school, bound to be a programmer or an architect. When I was around 14-15 I was really into Hip Hop and started doing graffiti. At that point I decided I want to continue with art, started going to drawing classes, where I was begging my friends to model for me as there were only plaster shapes and still lifes we could draw and I was craving human form. Painting came a bit later on when one of my artist friends was teaching me how to paint with oil. Initially I didn’t like it, as there were all these “rules” I had to follow that were not aligned with my inner perception. Eventually, when I went to art school to study painting, I came to understand why and how these rules apply, but I can now consciously choose whether I follow them or not.

https://simonaruscheva.com/
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