The Long Way to the White Paper

Some things find their way into our lives long before we understand what they mean to us.

For as long as I can remember, the visual world has had a particular pull on me. Colour, shapes, contrasts, compositions. The ability of an image to communicate something that words often cannot. To touch something within us without having to explain itself.

Perhaps this attraction began at home, where I grew up with my father’s paintings. Art was there, part of my surroundings, a quiet presence throughout my childhood. Back then, I could not have known how deeply this early contact would shape my own relationship with the visual world.

My first personal steps came during my professional training in art reproduction. I was fascinated by everything that was visually powerful, expressive and uncompromising. Strong colours, bold compositions, images that demanded attention rather than politely asking for it. Posters, flyers and collages became my playground. I enjoyed combining elements, creating contrasts and discovering how individual fragments could come together to form something entirely new.

Over time, other worlds opened up. Photography became an important part of my life, as did music. Both continue to fascinate me to this day. Photography taught me to look differently, to recognise moments, perspectives and details that might otherwise remain unseen. Music opened another dimension, one that speaks directly to emotion, rhythm and atmosphere.

Different forms of expression, yet connected by something fundamental: the desire to feel, to discover and to translate what moves me into something tangible.

And then there was painting.

It was always there, somewhere in the background. Familiar, yet strangely distant. Perhaps because my respect for it was greater than my courage to approach it myself. I admired the freedom of artistic expression, but admiration alone does not necessarily give us the confidence to step into something of our own.

Sometimes, the things that attract us most are also the things we hesitate to approach. Not because we lack the desire, but because we understand, perhaps too well, what they mean to us.

Life has its own way of preparing us. Experiences accumulate. Perspectives change. We grow through encounters, through detours, through moments of uncertainty and through all the things that seem disconnected while we are living them.

Until one day, something that has been building quietly inside us finally finds its way out.

For me, that moment came when I stood in front of a blank sheet of paper and began to paint.

It sounds simple. A white surface, a few colours, the first mark.

But sometimes a small gesture opens a door to something much bigger. That first encounter with my own creative freedom changed something deep within me. It was not simply about discovering that I could paint. It was about discovering a part of myself that had been waiting for permission to exist.

The white paper became more than a surface. It became a space without expectations, without predefined answers, without the need to justify anything. A place where I could experiment, make mistakes, let go and allow something to emerge without knowing exactly where it would lead.

And somewhere in that process, something shifted.

My awareness changed. My sense of self-worth grew. So did my courage to take steps I might previously have hesitated to take. The freedom I found in painting began to reach beyond the canvas and into other parts of my life.

I understood that creating is not only about producing something that can be seen. It is also about allowing ourselves to become someone we have not yet fully discovered.

Looking back today, I feel a deep sense of gratitude for every experience that brought me here. My father’s paintings. My years in art reproduction. The posters, flyers and collages. Photography. Music. All those moments of looking, listening, learning and absorbing, even when I did not yet understand what I was collecting along the way.

Nothing was wasted. Nothing stood entirely on its own.

Every step became part of a language I would eventually learn to speak in my own way.

Perhaps that is what I find most beautiful about the creative process. We often believe we are searching for something new, when in reality we are bringing together fragments of everything we have already experienced. We are transforming memories, emotions, observations and influences into something that belongs to us.

Today, through my work as Cacao and through Cacao Artes, I invite others into this personal visual universe. My online shop is an extension of that journey, a place where my work can move beyond the walls of my studio and find its way into other people’s lives.

Every piece carries something of this process. Not a complete explanation, not a definitive answer, but an invitation to look, to feel and to discover your own interpretation.

Because art does not end when the artist puts down the brush. Perhaps that is where another journey begins: when an image meets someone who sees something in it that the artist could never have planned.

I find something deeply moving in that thought.

We never really know which experiences will shape us, which encounters will stay with us or which quiet attraction will eventually become an essential part of who we are. We can only keep moving, remain curious and trust that the things that matter will find their place in time.

Sometimes, all it takes is the courage to face a blank sheet of paper.

And the willingness to make the first mark.

A space shaped by everything that came before, and by everything that is still waiting to emerge.