For over twenty years, I thought I knew what my art was supposed to look like. I built a practice around clean minimalist lines, deconstructing the world into precise geometric relationships. My work found its way into galleries across five continents, and by all external measures, I was succeeding as an artist. But somewhere along the way, I realized I’d been creating for everyone except myself.

The polished line work that defined my career was only half the story. Hidden away in my studio were these rough, scratchy oil pastel drawings—abstract interpretations of dreams, fragments of thoughts, whatever demanded to be expressed in the moment. They looked nothing like the work I was known for. They were imperfect, immediate, honest. For years, I kept them tucked away, thinking they weren’t “real” art.

It took a deep depression and some serious soul-searching to understand what I’d been doing to myself. I’d been performing the role of the artist I thought I should be rather than embracing who I actually am. When I finally started asking myself the hard questions—really peeling back the layers of expectation and fear—everything shifted.

Now I create from instinct rather than design. These black and white oil pastel abstract drawings on paper are like visual free verse poetry. They’re messy and spontaneous, born from whatever is stirring in my head—politics, philosophy, fragments of life that need expression. They’re not trying to please anyone or fit into a particular aesthetic. They’re just honest.

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Liz Mares (b. 1978) has been a practicing artist for over two decades. She’s also a published poet and a licensed esthetician who has spent over ten years specializing in compromised skin barriers, focused on Autoimmune Disorders and Oncology. She currently lives and works in the greater Chicago area, where she’s finally making the oil pastel abstract art she’s always needed to make.