Featured Artist Soila Tuominen from Finland.

Soila Tuominen inspired by literature and games.

I was raised on a small farm near many close relatives who all shared some interest in arts and handiwork. Thus, the environment was very supportive to any artistic endeavours and my imagination was free to roam, even in fantasy worlds and its creatures.

I drew mostly fantasy characters, inspired by the Dungeons & Dragons Forgotten Realms setting, which I got familiar with from related fantasy books and later computer games. My father also had the Lord of the Rings books, so writer J.R.R. Tolkien and his world contributed to the fantasy interest as well.

My first medium was graphite pencils, an easy and cheap to obtain tool. I used a lot of my free time drawing, alone or with my cousin. Sometimes I also used watercolours or acrylics.

Making a living in IT.

At later age I started to experiment digital drawing first using a computer mouse and later using a drawing tablet. My process was often to scan a pencil drawing (often also shaded, not just lines) and then I coloured it digitally. Once it was time to go to higher degree studies, I dropped art gradually altogether. I figured one cannot make a living being an artist, thus I opted towards a more secure career path in IT business.

Summer studies provide gentle nudge towards art.

In the last decade I have again slowly started to explore the art scene again.

At first, I was more of an observer with a few digital trials every now and then, but in the last few years, I have been more active due to the new summer university art studies that I started along my IT day job. With assignments and deadlines, these studies have given me a gentle nudge to be more active with painting and drawing during my free time, as well as providing nice relaxation from my IT work-filled head. I have been also doing a lot of self-studies, when not procrastinating, by reading art books and watching tutorials online.

Soila returns to traditional mediums

In recent years, instead of digital tools, I started to explore more traditional mediums again and I mostly paint now using water based medium. I experiment with tools, techniques and with whatever catches my interest. Currently I am enjoying watercolours the most, but impatient as I am, and easily bored and wanting new challenges, I like to explore all the time and have not settled on anything specific. Of course, there is so much to learn from watercolours alone, but it is quite refreshing to try something else from time to time.

My favourite subject is nature and I have been studying and painting some flowers in past years. One day I will paint as beautiful roses as grandma did in her porcelain paintings. Fantasy has not been incorporated much in recent paintings, but I do still also paint people from time to time, mainly portraits.

I am interested to see where my art journey takes me.

Follow Soila Tuominen...

Soila posts her fabulous art work on her website/Blog. You can find her blog here.

Soila is also on Instagram.

To view other artists who have been featured on my website in the last 2.5 years, please visit the Guest Artist page.

I am grateful for all the talented, productive artists and creatives from all over the world (photographer, author...) who have appeared on Louise's ARTiculations.

If you are a creative and would like to be featured in this space, please contact me. This feature will continue in 2021. I do not charge a fee to showcase your creative work!

Many featured guests remain in my circle of friends on social media sites, and some, I have even met in person.