There are many artists on Redbubble who produce consistently good work and among my favourites of these is Helene Ruiz. Helene is one of those courageous people who has fought against pain and learned to control it in order to continue producing her wonderful paintings.

Helene has a good sense of humour and told me that she has always been “a little odd” in how she visualized things. She joked that what is real to her is almost surreal to others.

I will be including a link to her portfolio, but first I’d like you all to read a little bio I did based on emails from Helene:

When Helene was a teenager, she won a scholarship to study at the Metropolitan Museum of Art back in the 70’s for a summer workshop. At one of the classes, Helene had the good fortune to meet none other than the great artist, Salvador Dali, whose words of encouragement inspired her immensely.

On the day in question, Helene, who “used to be embarassed back then cuz people thought I was nuts with my style,” was sketching a live model. The model was “on the chubby side” and most of the class were trying to draw her as they saw her, except for Helene, who visualised her as “a big fat beige candle that was too large for the holder” (her chair). Helene painted an oversized candle dripping over the edges ( that is how she saw the fat). Dali noticed it and became very excited….from that moment on, Helene was neither embarassed nor intimidated by anyone as to how she expressed herself creatively.

For Helene, art became her passion, religion and salvation. It is Helene’s way of surviving and coping. She paints what she feels, from dreams, premonitions, experience and events. All her artwork is done to a background of music. Just as a musician uses notes and tones to create their rhythm, so Helene uses colour to create her rhythm. She hope everyone can emotionally relate to at least something she has painted.

Her chosen medium is acrylic and she seeks inspiration from her life, where she works and how she works…which is in her cramped ghetto apartment’s kitchen in the Bronx, New York.

Helene was always blessed with the gift of “creativity,” but admits to taking it for granted all along until the day when she was involved in an accident that left her medically disabled. Medical staff told her she would never walk again and they put her on numerous pain meds and gave her “physical therapy.”

Helene lay in her bed for eighteen months and her daughter purchased a lap top easel to keep her busy during the daytime. Despite being drugged heavily on morphine for the constant pain, Helene painted intensely for hours and hours and one day she forgot to take her pain med dosage and had missed taking it for hours. It was then that she realized that through painting from her soul and her gut she had risen above her pain and on that day Helene threw out all her meds, called for her son and started pulling herself up little by little using anything she could to hold on to. Her son massaged her legs to help the circulation and she PAINTED, and PAINTED, PAINTED. Before Helene knew it, she was walking again!!!

To this day Helene paints about her life, her transformation and events. She uses colour to create the “rhythms” of her emotions. There is an obvious parallel between Helene and Frida Kahlo, both of whose lives were changed by an accident. For me, Helene’s artwork is easily on the same level of professionalism as Kahlo’s.

Here are three of my favourite Helene Ruiz paintings:

Now that you’ve seen some of her work and know a little about Helene, all you have to do to view her work is CLICK HERE

Thanks,

Dave.