Contemporary impressionist artist Lena Kurovska was born in Kyiv, Ukraine, were she still lives. Lena graduated from The National Academy of Fine Art and Architecture of Ukraine, where a lot of attention was paid to the studies and painting of the human body. After the Academy, she became very interested in outdoor painting. Lena believes that the direct contact with nature helps artworks to look alive and fresh and express the inner side of the plein-air artist. At the same time the contact with nature is a permanent circle – impression-idea, idea-impression. She often paints the same familiar places a few times and every time the result is different, as the understanding and impression are different. Most of the time Lena is painting outdoors. To paint a large size artwork, she combines the work en plain air and in her studio. Small paintings she can finish in one day. It is very important to adopt an idea to the changing state of the landscape. The work starts from small outdoor sketches, composition idea, the beginning of the work in the studio, then continuation en plein air etc. Small landscapes, painted en plein air catch this momentarily unrepeatable impression. “In a small sketch, it is very important to catch and show the moment and its disappearing impression. Landscape painting is very similar to meditation; it is a constant concentration, a study of feelings when you must select the most important and that creates the base for the individual. Simplicity is very important; very often less is better.” Her artworks can be found in the Art Museum of Taras Shevtchenko in Beijing, China, in private collections in the USA (California, New Jersey, Michigan, Georgia, Florida and others), Canada, Great Britain, France, the Netherlands, Hong Kong and Japan.