By Frédéric Vergnères
« Painting is not copying nature but learning to work like it ». This quote from Pablo Picasso, takes all its meaning in the artistic universe of Jan Erika. Her creations are contemplated in colors and with the emotions transmitted by nature, her source of inspiration.
And nature, which knows how to take its time, always does things right. Jan Erika, a multi-talented artist, has undoubtedly inherited this natural DNA from her family « deeply in tune with the beauty of nature » as she points out. Trained as a cellist, which led her to a brilliant career in concert halls around the world, the English artist became emancipated with painting. Like any artist, she has forged a world of her own which became even more present four years ago after a physical and emotional trauma suffered following an accident. From this painful period which lasted several months, Jan rebuilt herself like a metronome, painting up to twelve hours a day. More than sixty works came out of her imagination, like an open book on the artist’s soul. « This episode radically changed the vision of my life and the one I wanted to bring to it through art. I wanted a transition of life with more forms and more colors ». A rebirth therefore following the precept dear to Paul Ohl in his novel Katana: « Strength is born of adversity and suffering ».
Conceptual nature
And it is with the color and the innate forms of nature that Jan Erika develops her universe. Growing up on the east coast of England, in a family deeply in tune with the beauty of nature and the outdoors, Jan Erika planted the seeds of her passion for shapes, patterns and colors. She developed a love of what she calls « the rhythm of the landscape », which is reflected in much of her current work. While the backdrop of her work is equivocal, it is never ostentatious and is always part of a complicit gaze with the nature that surrounds her. The profusion of color is sometimes replaced by a calligraphic graphic art just as revealing and sign of a deep joy of living. A sine qua non for the artist who wants to share this state of mind through everything she does. Her first successes led her to paint at the Royal Academy of Art and at Kensington Palace. But Jan Erika’s work is above all declined on the supports of our daily life. Even if her preference is undoubtedly for murals that she sublimates with a timeless and colorful graphics, always in connection with its main thread. And taken to this game, Jan Erika sometimes goes further by developing the mirror and three-dimensional effect of water on these works by covering the entire walls of swimming pools of the most prized villas in the world. Beyond that, the artist’s abstract art is delicately placed on interior supports. She has made a name for herself with the creations « Zebramane » and « Pebble Dash ». A custom color work made with furniture imagined by the designer Stephenson Wright. A moment of escape that we like to imagine accompanied by the rugs designed by the artist in collaboration with Matthew Wailles Rugs. With this experience, Jan has pushed the concept even further and meticulously rhythms the art of the table by decorating a set of tableware for the American brand Juliska.
These few examples are finally only a tiny part of the creativity of this artist who has become unavoidable. In these difficult times, her universe is an ode to joy and an incredible message of resilience made of colors, calligraphy and natural subjectivity. Jan Erika is certainly like the nature that inspires her: a fragile but extraordinarily talented sphere.
