Oksana Rus (r-ou-s) is a Russian-born, USA based, International visual artist with multiple talents, living around the World. Since childhood she was involved in performing and visual arts. Her gifts were inherited from her family and developed with genuine care and proper tutorial of wonderful teachers leading her to receiving Masters Degree in Fine Arts. After graduation she left for her journey to explore the World realizing every dream and living by her infinitely majestic inspiration - the Ocean. Oksana is also fascinated with African animals included into her art collection.

Life for Oksana hasnʼt always been easy nor is that to say it is for her now, but she continues to focus on the positive and in so doing, also brings out the positive in all who learn of her and has built a very large fan base worldwide that she always takes time to thank personally when she can. From viewing it with the witnesses’ own eyes that on many occasions, people have written her to thank her and have said in so many words similar to the following: “When Iʼm having a bad day, I come here to your webpage and look at your works and words to feel better again…”

Oksanaʼs passion, natural gifts, devotion to her family and to inspiring humanity to rise above the negative, as she herself has done but to also unselfishly bring others in any way she can with her, to a more positive and legitimate place and also her desire to continue blessing this world of ours with lasting beauty, as well as her unwavering character and attention to detail makes her an excellent role model and a great inspiration to others for many. Her humility admirable, a very refreshing attitude for one so well blessed with talent. Oksana is also a well respected mentor for artists and people looking for guidance and sharing with mutual respect.

While art MUST speak on its own (to be art), works always refract the core of the person who created them. The works, both visual and those in words, reveal a real artist. As opposed to selfanointed or those so designated by arbiters of the “art world,” Oksana’s oeuvre shows that hallmark of an inner resonance of the things behind things, as well as uncontrollable compulsion to digest, reflect upon, and then communicate through her mind and manner, the resulting essence of her experience.

Her visions make you dive into tranquil meditating, hear the whisper of deep words like honey thick and golden leaving a sweet scent in the air clinging to the spirit long after they’ve been spoken, walk the beach and feel the warm breeze on your face and the soothing sand beneath your feet, watch a never repeating its symphony sunset, dance and feel your body move through space. She says “The world is full of inspiration from nature. All one needs to do is travel a bit slower on familiar paths, with wandering eyes and open mind. Breathing in the scent of flowers in bloom, and then exhaling the sound of roaming animals. All of life caught in a moment stretching infinity.”

The incredible power of all the elements encompassing the exploration and connection of all our senses constantly teaches Oksana to observe and exhibit in details how the sky is painted with color, bursts of orange in the sunset glow; the moon, in all its pride, fills and overflows the night with revelations of its light; the sun peeks through tree branches and sends beams as shiny as diamonds to the soft grass below; the clouds like fluffy cotton balls drift slowly by; the serene lagoon relaxes your whole being; the wave fights against the coral reef; graceful dolphins and breaching whales take your breath away…

Oksana’s wonderful sense and authority with color does not inhibit her use of other… While she clearly has a different relationship with humankind than she has with nature. She writes of “original nature,” and “places where nature has not been rearranged by the hand of man.” She sees the negative disconnect between the environment and its destructive inhabitants. This frame of reference is evident in her portraits and pencil drawings. She denudes these of the vibrancy of her palette of not only vibrancy of azure and turquoise, and instead renders human life as monochrome. The paintings of creatures other than man, sea turtles and are a part of nature and nature’s multi-hue essence. Even the gray by nature elephant she illuminates and with a range of electrically charged hues which nature failed to give it.

Interestingly, almost all of Oksana’s drawings of people are drawn askancely; the axis is at an almost universally distinct 45 degrees off erpendicular. Unlike “original” nature, which IS, and is rendered, naturally, humans are, and are rendered, unnaturally! Her “portraits” are not mere likenesses of humans, they are a collective commentary on humanity. This is the acid test of a real artist.

Poetry comes easily to Oksana, much to everyone’s pleasure as she makes us enjoy the spoken art and transcends it to a universal language where we are reassured of our individualism and encouraged to embrace the differences between people, to see the beauty of all creatures and objects. The artist is able to absorb what is offered and give of herself and what she has, generously with understanding, honesty and love.