Simi (meaning meditation and remembrance) is an Arctic Fox, living in the beautiful, yet harsh and isolated Arctic Tundra. It was so important for me to capture the awe and wonder of the Northern Lights - the overwhelming feeling I experienced when I finally witnessed them last October, just me (and my parents) under the sky. At the same time, thinking about the vastness of space and how tiny and fleeting our existence is made me feel quite small and even a little lonely. Of course, I wasn't alone when I saw them, and thousands of other people were all looking at the same sky, but when I think too hard about our place on Earth, I can get existential anxiety so there's definitely an undercurrent of something slightly fearful in this piece for me! However, that fear is offset by the beauty of this gorgeous animal and the vividness of the colours - it's impossible to see such colour and not feel joy! That tension between awe, fear, and delight is exactly what I wanted this painting to express.
