By
Dominique Amendola
Drigha Dasi

Since the age of four I have been drawing and painting. As a child, I followed in the footsteps of my father. Whenever he went out to do a plain air painting, he would take me with him and with my paper and crayons, I did my own art. Often I painted what I saw within rather than what I had in front of my eyes.

After many years of artistic accomplishments, I find that I still prefer to paint the mystical aspect of the world; even so I am also capable to paint a plein air piece quite succesfully.

I always thought I’d be an artist when I grew up. I was interested in learning all I could learn about the world around me, particularly the techniques of the old masters as well as the new ones. I studied in France, Italy and India, and traveled all over the world. Making art is an amazing process—hard to understand or really describe. It simply happens. Oh, there are lots techniques to learn, lots of processes to figure out, and lots of studies to be made, but in the end it is a culmination of more than all those things. It comes from inside and it will not stand much shaping—all the studies and learned skills only help me to give it a voice that is recognizable by others.

About my art in general and the way I work:

My paintings are not concerned with any notion beyond the limits and freedoms of my medium. The colors and the composition are my platform. Painting is problem solving. In my most recent body of work I have been exploring solutions to the challenge of creating an atmosphere on canvas, this is where my focus lies. In addition, the forms are the primary structures holding the composition balanced.

To create my paintings I use oils I grind myself into tubes. I also make my own maroger mediums ( two different ones : the Rubens gelly medium and the Titian wax medium). This allows colors to give my canvas a sense of vibrancy. Some of my paintings have more apparent brush strokes than others, which I really enjoy to show. The approach I take is that I paint the entire composition first. I then build my shapes on that solid foundation. I always make sure there is balance throughout my composition. My work has and will continue to involve landscapes figures, adolescence, and refreshing imagery, as well as spiritual themes. This is part of who I am.

Sometimes the research on a painting can take as long as the actual execution of the painting. That in itself is a very rewarding learning experience for me. The conception and the first sketches are very important. Then comes the painting itself and it should be executed as spontaneously as possible without loosing the freshness of the first jet.

The steps I take depends on the purpose of the art.

With these overall convictions as a basic template, my artistic vision is to create mystical images that reveal the beauty of life in all its inner form, but with emphasis on two areas more than any others. For the first, I am compelled to capture the natural environment in the form of people and landscapes in a realistic fashion.

For the second area, however, my knowledge of Vedic scriptures and my own internal meditation, drives me to create what was described by A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami as “Windows to the spiritual world”, both on Earth and on other worlds, surrounded by its architecture, its visible and invisible creatures, and perhaps a few surprises from the long forgotten past. It is in this second area that I yearn to turn my imagination loose for an unbridled journey.

Over the course of the last few years, I have come to learn about and explore innumerous stylistic approaches and subject matter. Each new style or form that I approached seemed to consistently yield interesting results, but struggled to maintain my interest, and I would seek out and explore a new idea. It was through this long process that I created many interesting paintings, and a palpable feeling of inconsistency. There was no repetition within the exploration – no pattern. Once and idea had been tried, it was on to another. Exploration of this nature was good for learning about many new ideas, but not for exploring any to their full potential. This has become my goal.

Now the question is how do I get people as excited about my art as I am? Well, this is simply that I try to bring my viewers the quiet poetry of an internal world rich with spiritual and artistic vision. I have been told that my paintings "grow” on people. After hanging my pictures in their home people start to see a “thousand things” they did not notice before. They continue to be delighted and inspired from the artistic experience.

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