MY BIO:

Playing in mud.

Walking through a forest embraced by filtered sunlight.

Rolling sideways down a grassy hill.

Burying my nose in fragrant pollen, between colored petals.

Hiding in bushes.

Falling on soft snow.

Swimming.

Dreaming.

I grew up in a paradisiacal garden, in a house in the center of historic Bucharest. We had a large variety of vegetation: decorative, fruit bearing, climbable, and of many colors - roses, poppies, pines, apples, figs, cherries, apricots, peaches, plums, grapes, raspberries, honeysuckle, big yellow and white bushes, with many butterflies, insects and worms throughout.

My brother and I spent half our summers in a village in the mountains, catching lizards, feeding ducks, swimming in the rocky river, picking berries in the forest and chamomile on the side of the road, and the other half at the sea, staying with a family which grew fantastically large vegetables, particularly very tall tomatoes.

When our neighborhood started being demolished to make way for the huge communist palace, the second largest building in the world, we played freely on the abandoned construction sites. While our parents, grandparents, and friends suffered watching the greatest modern urban tragedy unroll, we had the most fun of our lives: burning, cutting, breaking, making.

During all this time, I read with great passion a series of books entitled Poveşti Nemuritoare (Undying/Immortal Stories) - a large collection of international folk and fairy tales filled with magical symbolism. I still can recount many of them now; so powerful were they, that they have become a part of me.

These first ten years of my life are my true formative experiences, giving me curiosity, a love for nature and landscapes, the desire to explore and an understanding of magic, symbolism, mystery, things sacred and scarred.

Following this, much later in life I delved inquisitively into the subjects of art, religion and psychology, from the cultural and philosophical perspectives, particularly to answer questions about the need and search for meaning, the place for symbolism, human history, human consciousness, dreams and the role of the imagination.

The three authors who influenced me greatly are Andrei Tarkovsky in all his films and in his book Sculpting in Time (the philosophical meaning of art and humanity, the notion of sacrifice in the creative process, the role of the artist as a spiritual guide), Daisez T. Suzuki in his book Zen