givejoydesigns
Airport West, AUSTRALIA
About the Artist:
My name is Mark Rusic. This is my darling wife Susan in the photo. The world is full of amazing places. I especially love our city Melbourne, which is the subject of a lot of my painting.
Anyway, my motivation for painting goes deeper than mere sentiment, and just trying to earn a dollar. Like most artists I am passionate about my painting, but that was not always the case. At a young age I experienced emotional wounding when my parents tragically split apart. I was deeply hurt and confused by it all. I just did my best to carry on in life. Someone very dear to me was very artistic, so in rebellion I chose totally unrelated disciplines of science and engineering instead of things related to art, at university. Due to my hurt, I think I somehow associated art with something evil, that could hurt me, or eventually lead to misery. This was especially due to my frustrations with my dear family member. I guess, I thought that by suppressing my desire for art, it would protect me from further complications in life.
Anyway, you know what living in denial did? You guessed it, the pain just grew worse and made things harder. I don’t recommend it. Also, my creative expression just totally vanished. Despite showing good potential for art at an early age, the gift seemed to go into a kind of cold storage. How sad; I ended up becoming a frustrated young man in my early years. But, then one day I had an amazing turning point in my life! I had a remarkable spiritual encounter when I accepted Jesus Christ into my heart. I realized that my heart had been captive to bitterness all along. I had let the root of bitterness toward someone very dear to me, and life circumstances get the better of me. But, after recognizing it I came to know complete freedom from it. I mean full on freedom; the real deal! Why could I forgive? Because I had come to know God’s great love and forgiveness for me through Jesus. So, with that love in my heart, and after some encouragement from my someone very dear to me and my brother, suddenly my creativity began to flow again! I thank God for my father who believed in me and my mother who endured faithfully for many years standing by me. The hurt from the past and the anger were all sorted out and over! After showing unconditional love for around two years to my dear family member, things changed and reconciliation broke out throughout my family. In fact, after my parents were apart for around 15 years of separation, they came back together! That love from above moved mountains. Jesus said" “Nothing is impossible for God.” I believe it friends. Anyway, back to my art…You see after all these things, suddenly I could do art again. But, instead of my former lifeless, somewhat morbid works, now color and meaning dominated! The vibrancy and color of my art work reflects that wonderful inner healing that took place by God’s spirit.
You are not just looking at another pretty picture, but they are an expression of the master piece God has worked in my heart. My heart feels filled with God’s love, peace and joy. No wonder there is colour! Life is a joy. I believe God can fill your heart to the brim with his amazing love too. Whatever your experience; he knows and can help you too. I believe with all my heart that Jesus died to cancel all our huge debt to God so we can live in true freedom from the devil’s power. We’ve all made mistakes; no one’s perfect. The truth is when we trust in Jesus we can have freedom from anger, greed, depression, sickness, loneliness etc.. you name it. He paid for it all on the cross. He last words as he finished his mission on earth were “It is finished”. A lot of people speak of what we need to do to go to heaven; Jesus spoke of what he did so we are sure of getting there!
My experience in finding God and loving my art again is best summed up through the words of the psalms in the bible: “He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song(art work) in my mouth(hand), a hymn(picture) of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the LORD” (PSALMS 40:2-3). May these paintings comfort your soul! God loves you. Tomorrow is new day. Yesterday is gone. Today may have been a rocky one. But, tomorrow is new day! Enjoy it. God bless you!
