About Mona-Lisa Haldane

Feb 2009

I believe that from inception, my brain was primarily wired for the Arts – Not Science! It wasn’t until a couple of years ago that “I returned to two of my first loves,” which are drawing and painting. I have painted with watercolor and acrylic, but oil has become my favorite medium.

I took drama classes for a few years in high school and was told I was a great actress. I not only played the leading role in drama and comedy, but I would write and directed plays. I was told to take a one-way flight to Hollywood on Career Day. For a teenager, that seemed quite a stretch.

I believe that from inception, my brain was primarily wired for the Arts – Not Science!
I also love music, I love to write my own songs and poems, and I love to draw and paint.
Indeed, that’s a lot! But it’s all art – I BREATHE ART!

Mona-Lisa Haldane is an interior decorator that loves to draw, paint and write.  She lives in South Florida.

If I had to choose which of the arts that I really love, it wouldn’t be one. It would have to be:

  • Poetry
  • Drawing
  • Painting

I’m Mona-Lisa Haldane; for many years, I have been an interior decorator. I live in south Florida with my husband and children.

It wasn’t until a couple of years ago that “I returned to two of my first loves,” which are drawing and painting. I have painted with watercolor and acrylic, but oil has become my favorite medium.

Before I do a painting, I read two of my own quotes that are posted in my studio.

  1. A picture says, “Hello.” However, a painting should enchant you to come in and stay for quite a while.
  2. An artist, when drawing, must capture every vital detail, yet it’s a great painter that will transform even the simplest drawings into powerful illusions that will be imprinted deep within our souls….I strive to be that great painter!

My journey into art formally started the first week of high school – and ended that first week…. An amazingly elegant woman entered the classroom, seemed like she was headed for the runway. She introduced herself as the art teacher. No one believed her. She instructed us to draw the funniest thing we had ever seen. I drew two deer kissing on a snow-capped mountain.

I was pleased with what I drew. It was from the memory of what I had seen in books. She got up and went from student to student, staring at our drawings. She went and sat down in silence. We held our breaths. Mentally I was screaming, “Speak up, woman!” She made a general comment that the works she had seen weren’t all that bad. Our hearts fell.

Then she told me that I should think about seriously doing art because she believed I had a gift. I had happy butterflies in my stomach. To think that all the years of deliberate drawings, doodling, and coloring on the walls, in the bible at church, and on the floors at the doctor’s office – had paid off.

That evening my happiness was dashed at home when I told my grandmother – who had come to visit – what I thought was great news.

She told me to forget about drawing, that it was not real, it was all a dream going nowhere! She reiterated that people would laugh at me and that I would never get any respect. Moreover, it’s a man’s kind of dream! After such a brutal lecture, I forgot about drawing and my coloring as well.

Physically I attended art class, but mentally I was forever absent; I never again participated – barely. When the teacher approached me about taking advanced drawing lessons, I firmly told her no. I would watch other students who could barely draw stick figures progress. My heart was crushed, and my soul bled.

Eventually, I selected literature and drama classes as coping mechanisms. Ironically, while studying literature, I discovered a deep love for poetry that equaled my love of drawing. It wasn’t until my early thirties (almost two decades) after high school that I bought a few watercolor and drawing kits and started to draw and paint on my off-days from work and while the children were at school.

I did less than a dozen drawing lessons, about five watercolor lessons, and two acrylic lessons. It has pretty much been a self-taught trial-and-error affair. Finally, I started oil painting and have been hooked ever since. I have studied briefly under a master painter.

It seems like my years of mainly self-taught drawing have helped me somewhat whenever I paint. I still doodle, and I will always be writing poems; however, I have dedicated an immeasurable amount of time to oil painting.

Today here I am painting AND sharing it with the world! I’ve oftentimes pondered; If maybe my beloved grandmother was alive to see these paintings that I now present, What would she say? OR The fundamental question is; Had she still been around me, would I have ever finally delved into the things I had always held so dear to my heart, such as Poetry, Drawing, and Painting?

Mona-Lisa
Founder & Artist