Painting Peace (2026) Original Acrylic Painting by Nataliya Bagatskaya

At first glance, this painting presents an intimate scene of everyday life: a young woman sits curled up in a deep green armchair while her black cat quietly eats from a bowl on the richly patterned carpet. The warm ochre wall, dark curtain, vivid red accents and cool blue clothing create a distinctive domestic atmosphere that feels both familiar and slightly dreamlike.
But the story behind the painting is very different from what the peaceful image initially suggests.
The cat in the painting is my real cat. He needs me to stay beside him while he eats, so I sit nearby until he is finished. It is a small, almost insignificant ritual — the kind of ordinary moment that would normally pass unnoticed. During wartime, however, these simple routines became unexpectedly precious.
I painted this scene on an easel while ballistic missiles were exploding outside my window. Inside me there was fear, tension and chaos. Yet I clenched my teeth and continued to paint an ordinary life: a woman in a chair, a cat eating his food, a quiet room, familiar colors and a moment that feels completely safe.
Nothing in the painting directly depicts war. There are no explosions, weapons or ruins. Instead, the work portrays what I was trying to protect from the reality outside: the possibility of tenderness, routine and normal human life.
The woman appears thoughtful and distant, while the cat is completely absorbed in the simple act of eating. Their different states create the emotional tension of the work. She seems to carry the invisible weight of the world, while he remains present in the immediate moment.
The painting therefore becomes a study of contrast: peace and danger, vulnerability and strength, fear and persistence, the extraordinary circumstances of war and the ordinary rituals that help us remain human.
For me, this is not a painting about escaping reality. It is about refusing to allow reality to completely define us.
I was painting peace while listening to war.
The quietness of the scene is deliberate. It represents a form of inner resistance — the decision to continue creating beauty, caring for another living being, and preserving fragments of normal life even when normality is under threat.
I hope the painting first draws the viewer in through its colors, composition and intimate atmosphere, and only afterwards reveals the deeper story behind the image. Once that story is known, the apparently simple domestic scene becomes something more: a record of a private moment in which creating art became a way of holding on.
This work is especially meaningful to me because its peaceful atmosphere was not invented from a peaceful reality. It was created in defiance of an unpeaceful one.

Dutch acrylic paints Amsterdam™ and Italian canvas by Unico were used. The artwork is finished with satin varnish, with painted edges matching the background. Created on a pre-stretched canvas on a wooden frame. Signed and accompanied by a certificate of authenticity. Carefully packed for safe delivery.

Materials used:

acrylic paint

Details:

• Acrylic painting on Canvas
• One of a kind artwork
• Size: 110 x 90 x 1.8cm (unframed)
• Signed certificate of authenticity
• Style: Photorealistic
• Subject: People and portraits

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