Laura Freitas in "Island"for the first time.

“Art is a way of sending a message.

When I draw, I feel like I’m looking at the stars searching for something else which I haven’t found yet, because life is hard and sometimes we don’t get what we want.”

Laura Freitas is a local artist who works in the Train House of Funchal and paints in her free time, she’s also a photographer.

She started painting last year, she did some drawings before but never for exhibition until now.

Everything started for her when she decided to enter in a competition for painting, since then she was invited to another exhibition of local artists where the curator liked her work and invited her again.

This year she has decided to apply with some of her work to the new exhibition “Islands.2021.Revival” at Art Center Caravel.

She told us that there is a big difference between her photos and her paintings, even if they are both about the same topic, nature.

While with photography she concentrates on small details, tiny things like flowers or insects for example, in her paintings everything is bigger and far away.

She got inspired to create her paintings because she always liked astronomy and she is a scout too, so she uses to spend the night in the mountain of the island watching the stars.

In Madeira it’s particularly easy to spot them since there isn’t any light pollution.

Madeiran landscapes on the left, paintings on the right

Madeiran landscapes on the left, paintings on the right

Her paintings are usually about the night sky or specific stellar objects inspired by real pictures, but sometimes she likes to do some research besides what she sees in nature to get ideas of what to paint.

Madeira has not only influenced her for the stars she sees at night in its mountains, but most importantly for the good environment she found at school where she studied art, which she thinks helped her boosting her creativity.

By Steven Gheno