Courtesy photos

ARTIST: Irina Bezruchko, 27

MEDIUM: Paintings with mixed media

BEST KNOWN FOR: Her own style of abstract expressionism. Bezruchko’s canvases are bursting with rich colors and textures, but she doesn’t aim to paint recognizable images. Bezruchko said people will look at her paintings and see a bird or a person’s face.

“A lot of times people look and see something different,” Bezruchko said. “It kind of creates an illusion that maybe there’s something there.” To Bezruchko, it’s more about the expressiveness of lines and colors.

Bezruchko says texture is the most noticeable component of her paintings. If something looks rough and scratchy on a painting, it may be because Bezruchko decided to mix sand and gesso. She also uses clay, along with rocks, dried leaves and other materials. Bezruchko said she uses the materials because it’s fun and because it gives the otherwise flat surfaces a three-dimensional element.

“It kind of creates movement,” Bezruchko said. While Bezruchko admits her Russian heritage might subconsciously influence her paintings, she said a more important part of her work is where she lives. When she lived in and around Rome, the Italian landscape was evident in her paintings. Volcanic rock that is black and other natural elements make Bezruchko’s Italian paintings seem darker. While living in San Antonio, the South Texas culture seeps into her paintings.

“The San Antonio (paintings) are brighter,” Bezruchko said. “It’s a different culture. It’s always warm and sunny.”

BACKGROUND: Bezruchko was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, and moved with parents to Brooklyn, N.Y., between 1990 and 1991, when she was 10 or 11 years old. She returned to Russia for a year of her childhood and then came back to the U.S.

Her parents decided to move the family because they believed Bezruchko would have more educational opportunities and because they didn’t agree with the then-Soviet government. Bezruchko received her bachelor’s in communication-film and television at St. Francis College in Brooklyn in 2002 and her master’s in film and television studies at Dublin City University in Dublin, Ireland, in 2006.

PAYING THE BILLS: Bezruchko recently started teaching the third grade at Atonement Academy, the parish school of Our Lady of the Atonement Catholic Church. “It’s a godsend, that school,” Bezruchko said. “I wanted to teach.”

CHECK HER OUT: Bezruchko’s abstract paintings are up through the fall at Armonart Studio, 1414 S. Alamo, Suite C3. The gallery is open from 11 a.m.-6p.m. Thursday-Sunday. For more information, call (866) 791-1295.

Emily Messer | 210SA contributor