Welcome
I am the artist Natalia Matveeva. I’m glad you’ve visited my website. Here you can explore my works. I would be happy to receive your feedback here.
I am the artist Natalia Matveeva. I’m glad you’ve visited my website. Here you can explore my works. I would be happy to receive your feedback here.
I have been drawing since early childhood. I made my first works in kindergarten on thin, yellowish paper with a simple pencil. Every day I would come home with a new stack of my drawings.
A little later I discovered felt-tip pens, and my drawing horizons expanded. I made saturated drawings that were both graphic and painterly in my sketchbooks. I liked mixing all the colors together to see what would happen; or making a painterly fireworks display with markers on paper; or tracing each color with a black outline — it made the drawing more expressive.
In art school, drawing only with felt-tip pens was officially “canceled.” I became acquainted with paints — watercolor and gouache. My first little watercolor box was a gift from my teacher. I still keep it to this day.
These days I most often create my works in oil and enjoy its painterly possibilities: impasto, transparency, depth of color, the texture of the brushstroke.
Despite studying in different schools, I continue to draw and paint with pleasure. I work from life and in the studio, in different countries and cities.
Every day — at home, on the street, in nature, in places that have suddenly appealed to me — I make small sketches. From these observations, the compositions of future paintings take shape.
I perceive the world through the prism of color and I enjoy it. I free myself from unnecessary details, I look for new images and themes that are close to me. I invite you into my world!
The series of my works come together by themselves. The “Urban Landscape” series is one of the largest.
I often travel. Cities and small towns inspire me to create new subjects. I am interested in both historical spaces and modern life.
I try to remember the atmosphere of a place I liked, the mood of the city. I make studies from life. Then in the studio I think through and develop the compositions I have found. On the canvas the subjects often change beyond recognition, and the result differs greatly from what was originally intended.
For me, Venice is painting itself.
Its narrow streets tell stories. A year ago on one of them there was a rag-and-bone man named Mario who loved to feed the pigeons. Now the little shop is closed, and only a notice of his death keeps his memory. In one of my works I preserve this story.
Here is my Venetian inspiration: the romance of moving on water; the countless little shops and stores — cozy and run-down; the remnants of meals on outdoor tables; the state of the water and the sky — as if frozen milk and jelly; the mysterious winged lion; the bright colors of the architecture; the theatrical atmosphere of night.
A meal in a late-night Venetian restaurant leaves painterly artifacts, and I swoop down on them like a raven with a pencil and a brush.
My spring trip to the southern coast of France. The blue color immediately caught my eye — it’s everywhere there. That’s how the series of works “Côte d’Azur” took shape, with this color at its core.
During walks along the shore I spied scenes and characters: a kiosk, the sea, a train, a cozy little restaurant, waves, birds, dogs, running figures, rocks, children, palm trees.
I improvised backgrounds on square formats and sketched several subjects that inspired me. Over the “accidental” background I painted using only a few colors: blue, white, ocher, and black.
Impressions from strolls through the coastal towns were added to this series, where the azure-blue color once again played the leading role.
In all new spaces for me, the first thing I do is hurry to the window. Perhaps a wonder will open — something unexpected and important to me.
I have loved looking out of windows since childhood. When I visited my aunt, she was always surprised at how long I gazed out of her window. And the windows in her apartment were special — the windows of an old house, looking out onto a cozy little front garden with a gate where flowers grew.
Mostly, my subjects are born from observation. Whenever possible I always make quick sketches. In summer I often paint studies from life in watercolor or oil. It is most convenient to work from life in places without crowds — in the suburbs, in small towns, or out in nature.
If a subject calls for further development and still interests me, I work on it later in the studio on a different format and possibly in a different material that, to my feeling, suits that particular composition: pastel, watercolor, charcoal, bistre.
I love soft graphic media — drawing bistre and charcoal — which I use for quick sketches. Sometimes I leave them on canvas and paper on equal terms with color and paint in some works.
Landscape is always accessible to me: it is my daily observation — quiet nature that requires no special conditions.
I am drawn to the atmosphere of an enclosed space — a room. In my works I strive to convey the mood of the place and the sense of human presence, whether obvious or barely perceptible.
Lighting, color, and details are important: a window, a door, a suitcase, a mirror, the things of a child or an adult.
An interesting theme for me is the bathroom interior: the objects with which a person performs their small daily ritual, and which keep intimacy and the everyday presence of life.
My still lifes are chaotic. They are not composed on purpose, but as if glimpsed from life.
One of my favorite themes is the remains after a meal: leftovers, dirty dishes, traces of everyday life. Breakfasts, lunches, dinners. Café tables.
I try to convey the presence of a person — what they touched and what they left behind: their arrangement, their order or disorder.
August–September 2024. The end of summer turning into the beginning of autumn. I visited Finland and created a small oil-and-watercolor diary with quick studies and lively sketches.
On this trip I drew only from life with oil, watercolor, charcoal, ink, and pastel. The wind helped me, the rain accompanied me. Cows showed lively interest — they were my daily audience.
For almost the whole month I chose subjects in the same place, not far from the house where I lived. And it turned out to be not boring at all — on the contrary, every day brought new observations.
The forest became one of the main characters of my plein air. And also: a little boat, clouds, pines, rocky shores, birches, moss, berries, rowan, toadstools, multicolored grasses, the lake.
Especially valuable for me was working with the morning state. In the city it is almost impossible to catch such a morning, and several times I woke up even before dawn to have time to see and convey the very earliest time of day on the canvas.
The apotheosis of the Finnish plein air was the fall of the pochade box with brushes and paints into the lake water from a small pier and the invasion of an entire herd of cows interested in painting.
Each time I want to capture a living image: a state, a mood, a movement. Mostly, my portraits are “portraits of a moment.”
My models most often are those who are near: close people, everyone who surrounds me in everyday life.
Linocut is my hobby. In this technique I make postcards and small decorative images. It’s my “mischievous” activity without big ambitions. Often the printing result is unexpected and quite striking.
I try different backgrounds for the images: colored, watercolor. Sometimes I translate subjects from my paintings into linocut.
I love color linocut. When I make such an image, I carve and print each color separately, so the unhurried process stretches over many days.
I live in Neuried and depict the everyday life of this little town. It is a cozy place with many quiet, lovely corners. I like Neuried’s everyday life.
As an artist, I am drawn to courtyards, slopes, paths, and the forest. The softly pink blossoming trees in spring are one of the town’s main adornments. The autumn forest, the anticipation of Christmas in the town, the flowering lindens, the old church — all of this has become the subject matter of my landscapes.
My solo exhibition has opened at Neuried Town Hall.
The exhibition features more than 40 works in various formats, united by the theme of urban and suburban landscapes. Among them are works inspired by Venice, Spain, and the town of Neuried, where I live and work.
The exhibition will run until the end of June. You can visit it during the town hall’s opening hours:
Rathaus Neuried, Hainbuchenring 9-11, 82061 Neuried
I will be happy to see you there and would appreciate your comments in the guestbook.
Natalia Matveeva
