When I was 5, I wanted to be a dentist. My aunty was a dentist’s nurse and because I wasn’t in a kindergarten I was spending time with her at her work. I always wanted to be a dentist and a driver, because my uncle — my aunty’s husband — was a driver and my father was a driver and my Granddad was a driver. I always loved machinery — and cars were something I loved — and I think it continued until probably you get a driving licence, and then something that you dreamt of, you can do. Then you get different dreams.
By the time I was 20, I was already studying modern art at the art college. Every time I was going down town I was passing by a local university and I saw the students leaning against the fence and having very visual, very emotional conversations, and I wanted to taste the same. I didn’t have a dream of what I would like to study, I wanted to be a part of that group. I have to say that I was very bad at school, I had C, B, it was never A’s but at the Art College, I started paying attention — at school I was just lazy — and at Art college I got a lot of A’s.
This gave me a straightforward way to the university, and I decided to study classical drawing. I became a part of those students on the fence, in the same place and it was amazing. My student years were absolutely beautiful. I loved the communication, I had the subjects I loved and the subjects I completely ignored and I knew the price I am going to pay but, philosophy, psychology, drawings, it was my favourite.
The whole student society, hanging out, going out, events, it was so civilised, it was something I could imagine in the films and what I saw in the films. It was such a liberation for me and after the second year I decided to leave home. In the Ukraine it is a really, really big step to leave your parent’s home because Ukraine is very similar to Italy. It’s always Mama is cooking, you can be married with children and live in the same home. I couldn’t face that.
Before art school and university I was taking after school classes in wood carving and I really loved it. That related to my first money earning experience: someone saw my work, a wooden carving board on the table, and asked who made it. It was my first order from the Czech Republic to make 80 sets of cuckoo clocks. I earned $600 on my Summer holiday and I have never asked my parents for money since. That was my first salary and that was a massive boost of, I cannot say confidence as I didn’t know the word confidence but, I think, faith in myself. I realised that the only person that can change my life is myself and I felt that I was completely in charge of my own life.
