About the Artist
Victoria began painting just a year ago (March 2025), with no prior formal pursuit of the medium. What started as a way to process emotion quickly revealed itself as both a passion and a natural aptitude. In the space of a year, she has produced over one hundred works, experimenting widely with technique while developing a distinctive visual voice. Working with an urgency and enthusiasm that belies her brief time in the medium, Victoria paints what she feels — unfiltered, expressive, and often hauntingly direct.
Her work draws from lived experience — grief, growth, healing, and wonder — rendered in bold colour and intuitive form. She approaches each canvas as an act of translation: the inner world made visible, the unspeakable given shape.
Bio written by Fletcher Crossman, award winning artist, as part of Victoria’s Light and Reflections mini exhibit.
Want to connect directly with the artist, inquire about exhibiting a piece or series, or purchasing the art? Reach out at victoria@ofcanvasandsoul.com or visit the Contact page.
Artist Statement
My artistic practice is an act of deep introspection, rooted in memory and the process of healing. Each piece begins as something I cannot yet name but feel deeply. Rather than depiction, I take these feelings and translate them into chaotic patterns, explosions of color, evocative landscapes, or some combination of the three. I attempt to translate what my parts (*IFS) are shouting; conversations between my past and present selves, between the girl who hid her voice and the woman who paints to reclaim it.
Beaches, bubbles, and the blonde woman are common imagery in my work. The beach, for example, represents both my childhood and my freedom, a place of surrender and renewal. Bubbles symbolize fragility and wonder, capturing tiny, luminous moments of breath before they vanish. The blonde woman represents my core inner self. These painted moments are intimately personal and, I hope, collectively resonant, as they explore themes of heartbreak, trauma, tenacity, and the small, profound moments that remind you that you are alive.
My artistic practice centers on repurposing discarded materials, embracing both randomness and the items’ former story. I allow the past lives of my chosen materials to blend with my own narrative. I scavenge the last drops from discarded paint bottles, salvage canvases from dumpsters, and use scrap paper, brown paper grocery bags, fallen branches, flower stems, seed pods, and disposable forks. I believe layering atypical mediums, resurfacing, and painting over what was once discarded is a profound metaphor for my healing, using every odd tool and technique available (*EMDR, DBT, MBSR) without erasing the past but letting it settle into the present as something that belongs. My method is deliberately uneven and messy, reflecting the unpredictable journey of true recovery. In this process, beauty emerges precisely because of imperfection, honoring the truth that reclamation is central to both my art and my personal philosophy.
Ultimately, my art is a profound form of healing. It is the way I process and make peace with the world, a practice that maintains softness without sacrificing strength. I paint to offer proof, to the person I once was and to anyone who feels unseen, that beauty is not found beyond brokenness, but powerfully within the wounds. My greatest hope is that my canvases provide a space where viewers can recognize themselves and feel less alone in the universe.
*Abbreviations for evidence based mental health therapies and techniques
IFS (Internal Family Systems, a therapeutic model that understands the mind as composed of distinct parts with their own voices and roles)
EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, a trauma therapy that helps reprocess distressing memories)
DBT (Dialectical Behavior Therapy, a skills-based therapy focused on emotional regulation and distress tolerance)
MBSR (Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, a practice that uses mindfulness and meditation to reduce stress)