A stroll through the studio of Danhui Nai
When I pick up a brush and canvas, I don’t feel alone. I feel connected with the world,” says Danhui Nai. “When working on a painting, I feel I am putting my energy into it. The painting then connects me to people, even if I am not there.”
Danhui Nai spends many hours alone each weekday in her quiet, simple studio. And there’s no place she’d rather be. “I can’t imagine my life without painting,” she says. Her regular routine includes getting up at 8:00 a.m. and bringing her breakfast with her to the studio. Sometimes, if an idea for a painting has come to her the previous day or in her sleep, she doesn’t manage to finish breakfast before the excitement of starting the new painting takes over and she begins to work. The artist usually eats lunch in her studio and doesn’t quit until 7:00 p.m. to share dinner with her family. Occasionally, she feels so eager to see what her finished painting will look like that she takes up her brushes again at night or works through the weekend.
Like her paintings, Danhui Nai’s studio is calming and uncluttered. Steel shelves hold neatly organized painting supplies and books. A single peach rose in a green wine bottle graces a shelf. The white-walled room has no windows and the painting table is surrounded with lights that simulate daylight. A door leads outside to Danhui Nai’s gardens, the inspiration for many of her paintings.
Danhui Nai planted the gardens herself. Pink, peach, white and deep red roses; bamboo trees and honeysuckle vines; jasmine; purple lavender and African iris; blue hydrangea; and multihued sweet peas intermingle their colors and fragrances. On nice days, she takes her breaks in the garden and sometimes paints outside. She loves painting flowers. Of her roses, she says, “I see the play of light, dark and shadow on a rose. I ask myself, ‘How can something look so beautiful?’ and I have to paint it.”
Danhui rarely has visitors to her studio, but every once in a while her toddler-aged daughter sneaks in. The daughter of two artists herself, Danhui says, “It would be nice if she became an artist someday, but I’m not going to push her.”
View Danhui Nai's Fine Art Prints