PAINTING WITH A CAMERA
Text by Naomy Hyvönen
www.substainablecommunication.fi.
🌟Shari sat by the window on a recent sunny spring day, her beautiful complexion radiating against the rays of sun. Her camera sat stoically on the table in front of her, and when she referred to it, it adapted a personality, becoming more than a camera. It brought things to life, clothed them with character. Born in Eastern Finland, Shari recalls her childhood days as full of adventure, embracing difference and thriving in her artistic nature.
Like many girls, she had a set of role models at various points in her life, artists who impacted her life and perhaps exuded the nature that was really in her. From an early age she joined dancing classes, and would rehearse in front of the mirror. Not surprisingly, Shari’s role models were bold public figures who dared to do what others didn’t. She looked up to Madonna for her bold style, Marilyn Monroe for her staggering beauty, Duran Duran for lyrics and Pelle Miljoona for his message. And perhaps owing to the camera that now sits poised in front of her, Shari followed movie makers such as Roman Polanski and actors such as Charles Chaplin.“I believe there is a reason why some people are brought up in front of others.” Shari says. “I believe that reason is not just for their beauty or intelligence. I think as humans we tend to see the ones that break the rules, because in us there is a need to break out of boundaries.
🌟”I reflected on her compact statement. Unhealthy boundaries limit us, causing us to be unable to see our impact on the environment around us, or our value in its change. Often within these boundaries we follow crowds behavior, even learned “bad” habits. Constrained in these habits, it becomes someone else’s responsibility to make our world more sustainable, while we continue to deplete it.
🌟Shari sips her cooling coffee thoughtfully. She’s always wanted to create something new, and as I watch and listen to her, I realize that she’s not only touching people with beauty through her camera. She’s bringing people up close to the things that matter most. To life. As she says, artists have a place to raise up others’ energy, to get them excited. And to get them moving to a direction.
🌟In today’s economies where talk increases on climate change, the expenditure of natural resources, and creating sustainable businesses, which are the voices that would steer mass population towards sustainable living? I think that answer lies in Shari’s own words. “As an artist, I recognize the impact I have in people’s lives – creating joyful moments or lifelong memories.” Most of all, she steers people towards appreciating the quality of life – clean air, conserved environment, longevity of life that leaves behind ripples of sustainable choices. “Sustainability is an important base for your work. We live in a world where many people value material things more highly than they ought. I lived a childhood that lacked a lot of things, yet I was not missing anything. What I didn’t have my mind created for me through my vivid imagination.
🌟Shari hasn’t always been a photographer. She’s been an avid oil painter, who has sold paintings in Spain and Finland. In her life, a lack of things did not stop her from pursuing her dreams. On the contrary, she fought through hardships, lived and worked in Spain, producing oil-paintings that today grace the walls of hotels and people’s homes. She followed her heart’s desires without depleting the earth by excess materialistic things.
🌟She laughs as she remembers one particular sale she made in Spain.As she speaks I glance again at her camera, the brush with which she now paints the world. It is Shari’s drive to change. She does not measure her life against a salary package, but against better values that promote natural existence, and a balance that creates flow in all directions of life.Though it is a slow road as an entrepreneur.
Shari is out to direct mindsets towards creating a sustainable future without excessive purchase of things, but rather by enjoying the blissful environment and life around them.
Through her camera.