Erin Rychalsky is a Massachusetts artist with a background in drafting, engineering, and software feature design. She discovered her love of art at an early age and always enjoyed painting with her grandfather in his basement workshop. Practicing art fell by the wayside for a number of years while studying and building a career; However, with the support and encouragement of her husband and close friends and family, she’s made it a priority in her life again. Erin enjoys watercolor painting, pen and ink, and charcoal drawing in her at home studio in Northern Massachusetts. You can usually find her listening to Dave Matthews while she works with her Shih Tzu, Reilly, lounging nearby.
Artist Statement
As someone who has always been encouraged to perform at my best in school and in my career, it was easy for me to adopt the attitude that anything less than perfect is not good enough. Trying to create art as an adult became hours of staring at a blank piece of paper afraid to put down a single brush stroke or pencil mark. After several emotional discussions with my husband, Dan, he helped to adopt a new motto: Dare to Suck. It sounds a bit crude, but what it boils down to is that we live in an imperfect world and it’s important to find the joy in simply creating. What does it matter if the piece isn’t perfect when the joy was in the process? With this new mindset, I’ve been able to use my art as a sort of therapy to help me to learn to let go, enjoy the process, and celebrate the end result even if it’s not exactly as I originally imagined because it’s exactly as the joy in my process intended it to be.