About the Artist

Dr. Ilmana Fasih, born in New Delhi India in 1964, is a Mississauga (GTA),Ontario, Canada based mixed media artist. She incorporates sea glass, pebbles, drift wood, semiprecious stones, gold leaf, french bouliion wire along with acrylics in her artworks. She pursued silk painting as a hobby for 35 years, but shifted her direction to using sea glass for storytelling as grief therapy, after losing her husband, a Pulmonologist, frontline healthworker suddenly due to COVID in June 2020.

Her artworks series reflect passionate themes like women empowerment, floriography( language of flowers), kids storytelling, climate change, its impact on flora, fauna and the planet. She is influenced by Indian miniature artist Ustad Mansur ( 17thC official painter in Akbar & Jehangir courts, who is known for his flora and fauna art) and the scientist Carl Sagan for his love for the planet Earth- animate or inanimate.
She does not create prints, merchandize from her artworks nor accepts commission works.

A train made of pebbles passes by a village, as a woman, her daughter and a dog, on their way back, watch it pass by.
A baby Panda made of white seaglass and pirate glass in a bamboo forest is trying to reach a beehive high on a tree with a bamboo shoot.
A collection of various white sea glass and and a bangle on a canvas board depicting how the creative process begins.
The artwork in process. Canvas places on a table.
A completed artwork showing a clown on a moncycle in a circus, with a seal balancing the ball in its snout.

Artist Statement

Each seaglass, pebble has a journey it went through decades or even centuries, tumbling in the waves, and finally one day landing on the beach, only to be picked by beachcombers like us. Their story remains untold, I always wondered. It then occurred to me that they can still become part of a story on the canvas, for others to see and appreciate their own untold story.

The artistic process begins with beachcombing to collect beachglass/seaglass, pebbles, driftwood, metal, shell bits (not whole shells) etc. I usually beachcomb on the beaches of Lake Ontario or Lake Erie in Ontario, Canada. I also collect ugly and filthy plastics as part of cleaning the beach, but show them to the dustbin and do not usually incorporate them in my artwork.

Once the idea and story of an artpiece is conceived, I sketch a rough design in my head only (not on the canvas) and search through the huge stash of seaglass/pebbles for appropriate shape, size and color to fit. The original shapes and forms are used( I do not shape any pieces), however, due to scarcity of certain colors, white seaglass are stained with alcohol ink or acrylics if required.

Being am a proud citizen of a multicultural Canada, my artworks reflect my South Asian cultural heritage in multiple ways- using borders(as in Indian miniature paintings), gold gilding, bright colors and names of characters used in the storytelling.

Every artwork I create has a background story, which can be accessed in the blog( still developing…) and a copy of it is given with the artwork sold. However, while looking at the artwork, viewers are free to imagine a story of their own.  Or be inspired by it and create their own story.

 After all, creativity is contagious and therapeutic. We must pass it on.