A self-taught artist born in 1982 in Nizhny Tagil, a city in the Ural Mountains, when she was four she moved with her family to Visakhapatnam, India. Growing up in an exotic location, she established an early interest in nature and painting. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, followed by her return, the country was devastated by economic, social, and spiritual crises. She couldn’t pursue a career in art, so she opted for an English as a Second Language major. After graduation, she completed her PhD in Comparative Linguistics. Her study of conceptual metaphor and its key role in human cognition and emotion helped her frame her artistic vision. Having moved to Santa Barbara, California in 2015, her passion for painting re-emerged. To further hone her skills and tailor her artistic approach, she has been taking classes from prominent contemporary watercolor artists. Her primary subjects include landscapes, architecture, daily scenes, and still life. The inspiration comes from what she refers to as “quotidian poetry” or “the ontology of the mundane.” Her art is figurative, but she seeks to depict what’s beyond shapes, lines, values, and color – feelings, thoughts, symbols, and visions. Similar to the notion of ‘ art form,’ she believes the most straightforward subject can potentially hold a magnitude of complexities. She finds her main medium, watercolor, both magical and maddening. Olga describes her process as something that initially makes her powerless and compels her to submit. Then, it teaches how to introduce changes without losing the captured: the effortless spontaneity, the fugitive nostalgia,and the ethereal beauty created in the initial chaos. To her, it’s like finding the essence of life itself.