As Richard Dawkins said somewhere, we are thoroughly visual animals. But our sense of vision is limited and entrapped by our equally important gifts: our minds, and our languages. Most of the time, we only see what we know is there, things our language has ready-made names for — our doors of perception thus clouded, we miss most of the world’s infinite beauty.
The art of painting cleanses the doors of perception and expands the human sense of vision. It helps us see the world more clearly and perceptively. But this shift in vision can only happen through co-creation, born from the magic synergy between the artist and the spectator. This is the art of seeing.
This site’s lofty mission is to help the art of painting to free our sense of vision from the entrapments of our minds and languages, and awaken us to the sheer beauty of the world in all its infinite glory. To put it more humbly, it is here to help you to stay in touch with the art of painting amongst the hustle and bustle of modern life, to keep open our connection to this infinite source of inspiration and knowledge.
My name is Elena Maslova-Levin. I studied painting as a young girl (growing up in St.Petersburg, Russia), but then abandoned it for the study of languages. I spent twenty years of my life fully immersed in the life of the mind, studying linguistic diversity and language universals. It is only when I returned to painting that my sense of vision was set free again. My visual reality is becoming brighter, more colorful, more beautiful every day (read my story, and/or see my work).