Water, Light & Memory
It All Begins Here
How It Started
The paintings you may know as Water, Light & Memory started with a moment I almost let slip away.
It began at the doctor’s office. I was waiting in the exam room.
I wasn't feeling well that day, which may be exactly why the painting on the wall stopped me cold. It was flowing — truly flowing — paint moving across a surface with a kind of fluid intelligence I hadn't seen before. I sat with it for a while, the way you can only sit with something when the rest of your life has temporarily gone quiet.
I didn't photograph it. I didn't even think to.
But the painting stayed with me. For three weeks it lived somewhere in the back of my mind, surfacing at odd moments. Finally, I did what any reasonable person would do: I drove back to that doctor's office at ten minutes to closing and asked if I could photograph it. The receptionist, to her credit, said yes.
From there it was research, then experimentation, then Yupo paper — and once I discovered Yupo, there was really no going back. The series follows…
Before the Surface
High-flow acrylic and acrylic ink on Yupo · 2026 · 24 × 30"Limited edition giclée print, edition of 10 · Signed and numbered by the artist
This was where it all began. I mixed paint with a glazing medium and used a straw to blow it across the paper — an effort-intensive process that demanded a lot from me physically. The paint resisted. It moved, but on its own terms, not mine. I loved what emerged, even knowing it wasn't quite what I was chasing. Sometimes the first attempt is less about arrival and more about learning what direction to walk in.
Shoreline, Remembered
It All Begins Here
The Moment Something Shifted High-flow acrylic and acrylic ink on Yupo · 2026 · 24 × 30"Limited edition giclée print, edition of 10 · Signed and numbered by the artistThis was when something shifted. I dampened the Yupo paper first, mixed high-flow acrylic with just a bit of water, and reached for Phthalo Turquoise, a drop of Indigo, and Metallic Gold acrylic ink. Still using the straw, still blowing — but this time the paint flowed. This was the feeling I had been after from the beginning. Looking at it, I could see water and an island, and the water looked so appealing I thought I'd like to sail on it.
After
It All Begins Here
High-flow acrylic and acrylic ink on Yupo · 2026 · 24 × 30"Limited edition giclée print, edition of 10 · Signed and numbered by the artist
This one arrived quietly, with silver. Metallic Silver, paired with Indigo and a touch of Phthalo Turquoise, again on wet Yupo. There is something the metallic paints do in the originals — a shimmer, a depth — that doesn't fully translate to print, and I've made my peace with that. The effect they lend to the piece is worth it regardless. After has a stillness to it that feels earned
Open Water
It All Begins Here
High-flow acrylic and acrylic ink on Yupo · 2026 · 30 × 40"Limited edition giclée print, edition of 10 · Signed and numbered by the artist
This one came from a new kind of confidence. After finding my footing with Shoreline, Remembered, I was ready to go larger. I kept the palette simple, just two colors on wet paper, and let generosity be my approach. I moved the paper, and it basically painted itself. Of all the paintings in this series, this one comes closest to that original painting on the doctor's office wall — that sense of paint in pure, unhurried motion.
© 2026 Original artworks by Paula Kirsch. Created with heart, layered with meaning. All rights reserved.
Confluence
It All Begins Here
High-flow acrylic and acrylic ink on Yupo · 2026 · 30 × 40"Limited edition giclée print, edition of 10 · Signed and numbered by the artist
This is where I let myself play. Bits of Metallic Gold, Turquoise, Indigo — I moved the paper and watched the paint pool here, find a path there, travel somewhere I hadn't planned. I was more adventurous with this one and the painting rewarded me with something more intricate and complex than anything that had come before it.
When I look at these five paintings together, something happens. The everyday falls away. I am at the water's edge, and I am in the flow.
That is what I was looking for in that exam room, and somehow — three weeks, one return trip, and a lot of Yupo paper later — I found it.