Interview with Elin Kereby
Elin Kereby is a contemporary artist from Sweden. She has a MSc in financial mathematics from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and a Masters in art from Milan Art Institute. She is a certified yoga teacher and spiritual life coach and has worked more than ten years as an executive in the finance industry. Her art draws inspiration from nature and is influenced by her passion for social change focused on empowerment and systemic transformation to enhance mental and physical well-being.
You transitioned from a structured career in finance to the fluid and expressive world of art. How do you reconcile the analytical and methodical aspects of your previous profession with the intuitive processes of your artistic creation? How has this shift influenced the themes and execution of your work?
It’s a continuous and never ending process of quieting the mind. I didn’t intend to paint intuitively when I started painting and tried for a long time to follow what my mind told me to paint. I knew about grit and skill-building, but I discovered that the principles of learning a skill differ from those of expressing one’s heart. It wasn’t until I was able to let go of my expectations of what I should paint and allowed myself to fully experiment and play that I could express what felt genuine and true within me.
I never get bored with the intuitive process because I don’t know what the end-result will be like. It’s a refreshing change from how most of us live our lives, focused on a planned future. Also, it serves as my teacher, constantly reminding me that I can’t control the outcome. It’s a practice of being present and listening to the heart. I can't think about what to paint while I'm painting. Similar to trying to think and speak simultaneously—you end up not knowing what to say next because you're focused on thinking rather than being present in the conversation.
You can be creative in a profession, but there's a distinction between being creative within the constraints of a mission statement and creating art for its own sake. I believe that working 80-hour weeks in competitive and bottom-line driven environments, inevitably leads to numbing and losing parts of yourself. The internal shift I’ve made and the personal work I’ve done to reconnect with my emotions, vulnerability, and spiritual self not only influence my artistic process but also shape the themes related to personal growth in my work.
Given your extensive training as a yoga teacher, life coach, and healer, how do these spiritual practices integrate into your creative process? Can you share how these elements manifest in your artworks, perhaps influencing the choice of materials, colors, or forms?
I’ve always been sensitive to energy and frequencies and the more I’ve committed myself to spiritual elevation the more aware I’ve become to the different ways that we connect with each other. Emotions and feelings are how we understand things in our bodies. Words and mental images can remain at an intellectual level where emotions are experience-based and instant. We intuitively connect with a person who shares the same feelings as us. However, we all have different experiences and emotions connected to words and images.
We have learnt that a tree is a tree, and so when we look at a tree, most of us have stoped being curious about it. Our world becomes smaller as we grow older because we have developed beliefs about everything around us based on our previous experiences. By engaging in spiritual practices we can expand our consciousness and free ourselves from the conditioned believes that we’ve grown used to. The world becomes bigger and more mystic again.
My art is very playful because I’ve freed myself from mental constrains in my creative process. I allow myself to follow my inspiration and paint what comes through me. It’s a practice connected to spirituality and feminine energy. I believe that my background in a masculine career has led me to using more feminine energy in my artwork. Both in the aspect of intuition and in the aspect of fluid lines and bold forms, which symbolize the transformational force of feminine energy.
Nature plays a significant role in your inspiration. Could you elaborate on how specific elements of nature have directly influenced particular artworks?
When I was about seven years old, I remember being outside on a sunny spring day and suddenly hit by overwhelming emotions of how beautiful everything was. It felt as if I was drawn in to and part of a world that I was otherwise just an observer of. This memory has stayed with me and I’m constantly reminded of how connected I feel when I’m in nature.
I’m intrigued by how the different elements of nature are reflected within us. Eastern medicine has used this understanding for over 3000 years to help create balance and harmony in our minds and bodies. In Ayurveda for example, body types are categorized according to the innate proportions of the elements - earth, fire, water, air and ether - that we are born with. In Feng Shui, physical spaces are arranged with the different elements to optimize the flow of energy and hence promote well-being.
In my artwork I seek to balance the elements, similar to how each element in nature supports and complements the others. I continue to paint until I feel a sense of harmony, using several layers and iterations. Most of my artwork and style consists of lines in different colors and thickness to add depth and contrast and together form the composition.
Having worked in a highly regulated field like finance and now in the liberating realm of art, how do you balance freedom and constraint in your creative expression? Do you find that certain limitations or boundaries enhance your creativity?
When you have limited resources, it forces you to come up with creative solutions and develop your creative thinking. That’s why I have chosen to work for smaller, mid-size companies and start-ups, where creative solutions are a daily part of the job. Even though the finance industry is highly regulated, you still need to interpret the regulations with regards to the size and proportions of the company.
I believe that this applies to all areas of life, including art and creative expression. The less resources you have, the more creative you need to be in bringing a vision to life. I found that limiting myself to lines in my artwork forces me to be more creative in expressing emotions and aesthetics. I’m drawn to the simplicity of lines and how many impressions you can create by using them in different ways and layers. From chaos to harmony. Chaotic individual lines when put together in a balanced way can create a harmonius impression as a whole. Much like in nature, where everything works together as parts of a greater system.
As a contemporary artist deeply engaged with the spiritual and emotional dimensions of human experience, what kind of legacy do you wish to leave through your art? How do you want your work to contribute to the broader conversation in contemporary art?
We’re living in times when the discoveries of quantum physics is proving that everything is energy and that all things are interrelated. Yet, in the West we continue to operate within systems that are rooted in outdated beliefs and often overlook the interconnection of the mind, body and spirit.
I want to contribute to more people having access to information about the many ways we can take charge of our own well-being and transform our minds, bodies and lives. In the West, holistic approaches remain under-recognized and seldom used or referenced by conventional medicine for managing chronic symptoms and preventive care.
We know today that the mind and the body is not separate and to achieve wellness we need to look at the body as a whole and not as a sum of its parts. Symptoms - whether mental, behavioral or physical - can arise from various underlying imbalances that disrupt the body’s natural healing ability. When viewing the human body as an energetic, emotional and spiritual entity, it becomes clear that any aspect can affect another in profound ways. Imbalances can be caused not only by trauma, deficiencies, and toxins but also by daily human emotions that can become trapped in our bodies.
We have so many options today for distracting ourselves from our emotions that many people walk around feeling disconnected from their true selves - the inner compass that guides us in recognizing what’s right and wrong for our bodies. As a result, many feel lost and powerless to their own thoughts, emotions, and circumstances.
With growing mental health challenges in the world, I believe that we need to talk more about holistic health and empower individuals with knowledge so they can make informed choices about their well-being. I also believe that corporations have a responsibility with regards to the systems that we are still working in that doesn’t consider individual needs to obtain and maintain mental and physical health. More and more people want to work for themselves to be able to be in control of their schedules, improve their well-being and be able to live life more fully.
