Nowbahari’s painting explores three dimensions: observing the outer world, feeling the inner world, and expressing the connection between them.
A painting is a tool for introspection. For Nowbahari, it functions like a camera: it is about painting (the act, verb) rather than the painting (the object, noun).
From the artist’s perspective, the act of painting itself carries the message. That message can be seen as a glimpse into the painter’s abyss: the finished work captures a deep feeling generated during the process, only to vanish immediately afterward.
But what about the observer? When viewing a painting, the brain links it to past experiences and thoughts. In this way, the painting still acts as a camera, and observing becomes the shutter. How the work is perceived depends on the observer’s focus and sensibility, making the act of seeing itself an active generator of feeling.
This creates a fundamental distinction: the artist is active only during the act of painting, while the observer is active only when engaging with the finished work.
His work blends neo-expressionism with abstract and minimalist elements, often anchored in figurative motifs. Oil is used for controlled brushwork, acrylic for quickly capturing ideas.
Influences include painters Georgia O’Keeffe, Pablo Picasso, and Wassily Kandinsky; philosophers Friedrich Nietzsche and Emil Cioran; and poets Pablo Neruda and Charles Baudelaire. Recurring themes include melancholy, women, flowers, life, and death. He is currently exploring feelings that are intense and often avoided, embracing their vitality.
Nora was inspired by the women painted by the Norwegian artist Astri Welhaven Heiberg (1881-1967).
Nora impersonates Melancholy. When she feels alone, she goes to the beach and seats on a rock. Here she thinks about her past, her present and her future.
As every human, Nora sometimes has that irrational fear of not being able to meet people’s expectations. But here, on this rock, by looking at the infinite number of sea waves Nora is able to gain her confidence again.
The work has been painted in Tjøme, an island in Færder, Norway.
She is worried about their future. That’s why she hugs him.
The equation on the right is the continuity equation for electrons.
This equation enforces charge conservation for the electrons.
A continuity equation is somehow a form of conservation law.
It other words it states that some properties of a system do not change as the system evolves over time.
When she hugs him, she hopes that her feelings are not going to change over time.
But the equation is defined for electrons, not for humans.
So his arms do not fully embrace her.
There is something that all grandmothers have in common. That wrinkle on their hand. That precious wrinkle carries a message.
There is a moment in the day in which they just wait for the eternal calm.
They got angry, they got happy. They got a wrinkle on their hand. The grandma is waiting for the eternal calm.
There is nothing else to do.
At the beginning of each year, I always try to paint something joyful. But there we are, with a pregnant woman who got a mastectomy. What is going on in her mind? Ok, it is not joyful. But it brings hope. Life did not stop for her.
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Arian Nowbahari 