Do You See the Same Colour I See? Simona Ray on Portraiture, Presence, and the Art of Truly Seeing

To paint another person honestly, you have to do more than observe them. You have to listen for what they have learned to hide.

For Simona Ray, commission work is not portraiture in the traditional sense. It is not likeness, polish, or surface. It is a meeting point between artist and subject, where colour, music, instinct, memory, and trust begin to form something that neither person could have created alone.

In this final interview of the series, Ray turns toward one of the most intimate parts of her practice: painting other people’s inner worlds. What emerges is a conversation about sensitivity, boundaries, courage, and the quiet responsibility of being seen. Not as performance. Not as projection. But as something closer to recognition.

After speaking across myth, presence, and intuition, this closing conversation brings the series to its most human point. Art as dialogue. Art as witness. Art as the space where someone may meet themselves, perhaps for the first time.

When someone commissions a piece from you, what is the first thing you try to understand about them before you ever pick up a brush?

I need to meet them. At least for an hour. 

I am listening for something that cannot be said in an email. I listen for the things they don't quite know how to articulate — the strength so native to them that they no longer see it as remarkable. I listen for the gap between who they are and who they believe they should be. And underneath that gap, I listen for what has always been there.

I ask practical things, yes. The size of the canvas. The colours they are drawn to, and the ones they hate. The purpose behind wanting the painting. But these are not the real questions. The real questions are unspoken.

I am a highly sensitive person. I feel things. And so I also need to sense: can I hold this story? Will this person's journey cost me something I cannot afford to give? Is this a connection I can sustain?

I can feel the difference. With some people, there is an opening. With others, there is a heaviness I cannot carry. Not because their story is less worthy. But because some stories — some wounds, some patterns, some emotional landscapes — would hurt me too much to paint.

I have the right to say no. Not all stories are meant to become paintings. I sense who I can paint for, and I listen to that intiuition. Because if I paint someone's story while I am wounded by it, the work dies. If I do not protect my own inner space first, I have nothing to give.

So before anything else, I am listening to two things: Can I truly see this person? Can I see them without being broken by what I see? That discernment is not rejection. It is wisdom.

It is important to note that the above goes both ways. Someone may not feel aligned after speaking to me — it is absolutely okay.

Your portraits go far beyond likeness. How do you translate someone's emotional life into colour, movement, and form?

What I paint is not how someone look — it is how that person feels.

On the day I start painting, I prefer if they are able to interact with me via messages. It is enough to anser one question. I have already prepared myself — meditation, clearing my mind, the space. I think of them. I listen to the music they gave me. I ask them for three songs — sometimes they provide a whole playlist, sometimes nothing, so I follow my intuition to find music based on my feelings about them. I paint listening to their frequency. Their music is moving through my body. I dance. During this ritual something begins.

Colour comes first. And this is the most important part: I cannot control what colour my hand reaches for. I can try — I can honour what they have told me they want — but ultimately, my hand picks what my hand needs to pick. If I tried to force it, if I let my thinking mind decide, I would ruin it. The work is not about my control. It is about reception.

So when I start painting, I ask them: what is the first colour that comes to your mind? And they tell me. That moment — when they confirm the colour I was already painting — that is when I know we are connected. That is when I know I am reading them correctly. The colour is the evidence. It is the synchronicity made visible. It is the answer to my childhood question: do you see the same colour I see? Yes. In that moment, yes.

And from there, the rest arrives. The movement, the form, the shapes that emerge under the brush. They come through me, not from me. I am following what wants to be seen in this person. And the painting becomes a mirror they have never quite been able to look into before.

How much listening happens before the painting begins, and what does "listening" mean to you in an artistic context?

Listening, for me ,is not hearing words. Listening for me is feeling into the unspoken.When we meet I am not taking notes. I am not asking a checklist of questions. I am present. And from presence, I feel. I feel what this person carries without knowing its name. I feel the stories they have internalized about themselves — the ones that have made them smaller than they actually are. I feel the beauty in them that they have learned not to trust.

It is a kind of knowing that happens beneath language. It is the capacity I have carried my whole life — to sense what is true about another person, before they have told me. To feel the shape of their inner world the way you might feel a presence in a dark room.

Only thing I can explain is that it requires that I empty myself first. That I come with a blank mind. That I do not arrive with theories about who they should be or what their painting should express. I arrive open. And from that openness, I receive.

The colour confirmation on the painting day is listening too. When they confirm the colour, they are not just confirming a hue. They are confirming that I heard them. That I felt them correctly. That despite all the ways we are strangers to each other, something true passed between us. And that confirmation sustains the entire work that follows.

Sometimes I contact them again throughout the painting. I send progress updates. I check how they feel about it. One person saw an ET-like shape in one form (which I did not see) — it seemed scary to her — so I made sure to change it. I do not want people to be scared looking at their painting. I must check if it is still aligned with them. But it has not happened that the direction would not be right.

Euphrosyne's Depths of Joy, Mixed Media on Canvas, 120x120cm, 2026

Working so closely with other people's stories can be emotionally demanding. How do you protect your own inner space while remaining open to theirs?

Protecting myself is not optional. It is essential.

The first check happens before anything begins. I sense who I can paint for. As I mentioned I do not accept every commission. I listen to what my body tells me about whether I can hold this particular story without being wounded by it. 

Then, before I paint, I cleanse with sage and sandalwood. Lately I call on Hekate — she who guards the thresholds, who knows how to hold sacred space between worlds. I meditate. I dance with the painting. I prepare myself to be a strong enough vessel so that their story does not break me.

And then, when the painting is finished, I have another ritual. I return to myself. I ground. I remember: this is their story, their journey. I held it. But it does not belong to me.

This distinction is everything. If I carried every client's pain as my own, I would be destroyed. Someone could identify me as an empath — that means I can feel what others carry. But feeling someone's story is not the same as becoming their story. There is a threshold. And I have learned to stand at that threshold consciously.

I also work with a Jungian life coach. The slow, careful work of understanding myself — of removing the layers that are not truly me, of finding my own ground — that is the foundation everything else is built on. I cannot be truly present for someone else's inner world if I am not present in my own.

Have there been moments when a client's story changed you personally, or altered the way you see the world?

I have realized how different people can be than the pose they show to the world.

That is the real education. Not learning about their specific stories. Learning what they actually are beneath the version of themselves they have learned to present.

Every person carries a public face — what they have learned is safe, what they believe is acceptable, what they think people want to see. And then there is the person underneath that armour. The one who knows things about themselves they have not yet claimed. The one who is stronger, deeper, more complex than they believe.

When I paint someone, I am not learning their biography. I am discovering the distance between who they are trying to be and who they actually are. And that gap — that is where the work lives.

I see this gap with every single person. And it changes how I walk through the world. It makes me understand that we are all performing. All of us. Constantly. And the loneliness underneath that performance is enormous. But so is the hunger to be known beneath the performance. To have someone see past the pose and recognize what is actually there.

This understanding does not come from their stories. It comes from the repeated shock of recognizing the same pattern everywhere: the gap between surface and depths is where we are all suffering. And it is also where genuine seeing becomes possible.

Do you ever feel a responsibility toward the people you paint, knowing that you are shaping how they may come to see themselves?

I do, but I do not look at it as a weight. I accept it as an alignment. As something, that needs to happen.

I know I will get it right. And I know this because we have already aligned before the painting even begins. The meditation. The listening. The confirmation of the colour. The messages. By the time I finish the painting, the work has already been in conversation with them.

So when they see the finished piece, they are not seeing a stranger's interpretation. They are seeing themselves mirrored back — something they have always known but could not quite look at directly. And in that moment, I respond to what they need to see.

What I find beautiful is that in some cases, where the painting was not supposed to be in main spaces like the living room, the painting actually ended up in a prominent space. It is very heartwarming and rewarding that I was able to provide something so meaningful to them.

With every person it is different. Some people see the painting and tears arrive. Some do not react much. I read the poem. I play the song that moved through the painting. We sit with what has been revealed. Others feel uncomfortable — and that discomfort is exactly what they came to feel. One person wanted to paint over a small part of it with me. They did not feel comfortable with someone else seeing it. They needed to participate in their own becoming, not just receive it. I follow what arrives.

I have had people tell me they feel like I have known them for ten years after reading their poem. I have had people asking: how did you know? I did not know through words. I knew through a listening that goes deeper than words — through the capacity to feel what lives inside them beneath the version they show the world.

So the responsibility is not a burden. It is a trust. I trust that when we align — truly align — the work cannot fail. Because the work is not about my skill or my vision. It is about the truth that was already there, waiting to be seen. I believe that everything happens for a reason. Things happen at the right place and the right time. Even though it is sometimes very painful.

In an age of filters, curated identities, and digital personas, what role can honest portraiture still play?

Everything. Honest “portraiture” is the antidote to a world built on performance and masks.

We live in an era where most people are not living their lives — they are curating them. They are producing images of who they should be, not sitting with who they are. And from that disconnection, they reach toward each other and wonder why contact feels so thin. Why they feel lonely in rooms full of people.

What my commission work offers is the opposite of a filter. It is an invitation to be seen without correction. Without the reflexive editing of the conscious mind. To be witnessed in your full humanity — the shadow and the light together, the struggle and the strength at once.

In a world of endless performance, there is a kind of courage required to sit still and allow yourself to be painted honestly. To say: yes, paint not what you see, paint what you feel. Paint what arrives.

And when that painting is finished, it stands as evidence. It says: this person is beautiful in his or her humanity, and kindness. This person was worth knowing. This person's inner world was complex and worthy and alive.

In an age of filters, that honest witnessing is not decoration. It is resistance. It is a small but radical act.

What happens when someone sees themselves in your work and recognises something they hadn't noticed before, something vulnerable or unresolved?

It is different with every person. And I respond to what that moment actually requires.

Some people see the painting and feel uncomfortable. That discomfort is real. That discomfort is exactly what needed to be seen. I do not try to soften it or fix it. I let it be.

Some people want to participate in their own mirror. They come and we paint a part of it together. They need to know they can shape what they are seeing. That the painting is not fixed. That they have agency even in being witnessed. And I trust that — I follow what they need.

Some people stand in front of it and the tears come. Then I read the poem. I play the main song. We sit with what has arrived. We hug. We respect. We open our eyes to endless posibilites of seeing. At least for a moment.

What I have learned is that there is no single right response. The moment itself tells me what is needed. Presence. Silence. Participation. The reading of words. The playing of music. Sometimes all of it. Sometimes just the painting itself, held in attention. Sometimes I cannot hand over the painting personally, but that is also okay.

What I am witnessing is not discomfort or healing as abstract things. I am witnessing a person meeting themselves. And that meeting is sacred. It deserves whatever response will honour it most truly.

I do not interpret it for them, unless they ask. I do not explain what they are feeling or what the painting means, unless they ask. I simply start with holding the space and respond to what wants to happen in it.

Theia and Her Secret Faces, (1:5) Mixed Media on Canvas, 120x120cm, 2025

Do you think collaboration between artist and subject can create a deeper form of truth than working alone?

Yes. But it requires a very specific kind of trust.

When I am working with a commissioned portrait, the collaboration is not democratic. I am not checking in constantly to make sure they approve the direction. But it is a dialogue nonetheless. I listen to them through their words. Sometimes I ask additional questions if I feel there is something new I have discovered, or if there is a change. Or if I need help to attune more. I feel into their world. And they are present — even when they are not standing next to me personally — they are shaping every brushstroke.

The truth that emerges from this collaboration is different than what I could create alone. If I were painting an imagined person, I could paint what I imagine. But when I paint an actual depth of a person, some people believe I paint souls, when I have sat with them and felt their reality, something else becomes possible. A truth that is neither entirely mine nor entirely theirs, but something that exists only in the higher consciousness itself — a truth perhaps that needs to be known or realized sooner or later.

This is what makes commission work so powerful. It is not portraiture as extraction — me taking your story and making my art from it. It is portraiture as partnership. I bring my sensitivity, my intuition, my technical skill arrives with you. You bring your presence, your courage, your willingness to be seen. And from that combination, something true arrives that neither of us could have created alone.

Looking across this series of conversations about presence, intuition, myth, and dialogue, how would you describe the deeper purpose behind everything you create?

To answer the question that has lived with me since childhood: do you see the same colour I see?

Not the literal colour. The question underneath. Do we see each other? Do we truly know what it means to be seen? Can we recognize another person's reality — their struggle, their strength, their inner world — and meet them there without flinching?

Everything I create is an attempt to build a bridge across that gap. The paintings. The SEE YOU performances. The poetry. The interactive experiences. Even this conversation.

I believe that we are all carrying beautiful, complex inner universes. And I believe that most people are starving to have someone truly witness that universe. Not judge it. Not fix it. Not improve it. Just see it. Recognize it. Say: yes, I see what you are carrying. And it matters.

This is why presence is so important to me. Presence is the technology of genuine seeing. In a world of endless distraction and performance, the simple act of being entirely here — with another person, with the canvas, with the brush, with the colour — is a radical act.

And I believe that through this act of witnessing — through honest “portraiture”, through authentic presence — we can wake each other up. We can remind each other that we are real. That our inner worlds matter. That the fall is not the end of the story — it is the beginning.

Every painting, SEE YOU project, every poem, every conversation — they are all attempting to answer that one question: do you see me? And beneath that: can I see myself?

The answer, I have learned, is yes. But only if we stop and look. Only if we are willing to be present. Only if we offer each other the gift of genuine attention in a world that is designed to scatter it. If we do not tell one another who to be. Now I want to add something very important to me, something what I have been holding and thinking about as I walk through these series, through these conversations, through my life and my art.This world seems dark. People compare their real stories — the struggles they carry within — with the fabricated masks displayed everywhere: on social media, in magazines, in the carefully curated lives around them. They judge themselves. They think that falling is failure. They think that their unique “different” journey or their timing is wrong. Misaligned. But it is not true.Falling is not failure. With all my work, with the Greek mythology goddesses arriving without any plan of mine — I do not think it is random. I wonder if my art should spread a message of hope. Of light. I do not even understand how it all arrives to me. I do not understand how I began painting Greek goddesses, where their words come from, their wisdom. But it feels like they would be here. Lately I have been walking around the Jungian series — the trilogy and the pentalogy — paintings which were arriving one after another with their poems. But after finishing the last piece I realised what kind of depth it holds and how they are connected. Soon after I went to meditate and suddenly I had an idea in my mind for creating an interactive experience. 

I paint under Hue lights and live in a coloured world when it is dark. I am still finding new faces, new bodies, new symbols in every painting. And I ask myself: how did it get there? I do not understand it. But sometimes we do not have to understand everything. I feel extremely grateful, privileged, honoured that I have this ability. Perhaps the Greek gods have never really left us. Perhaps they are deeply important for shaping our psyche. There could be so many reasons, but the important one for me is: if they were allowed to be imperfect, why could not we?

We can also learn another lesson with them. These deities were flattened into symbols throughout centuries. I believe that not always has their real story been told. It shows something about our perception and understanding of one another. Is everything we hear true? Is everything we see true? How do we know that the person who is smiling is not suffering from domestic violence? How do we know that someone who left a partner has not contained their real story? How do we know that other people do not manipulate us? How do we know that all is as perfect as it seems?

In my opionion, due to this inability seeing our real selves, and each other, we are facing all those problems in nowadays world. 

I believe it all starts with us. We shape the world every morning by a decision: Do we see our own selves? Do we smile at this person we see in a mirror? Do we give love and care to this unique human? Do we try to be positive? Because then we walk out of our own door different. Authentic. We perhaps smile at a stranger, whose life has been breaking. Someone who thinks that it would be better not to be here. And our smile, possibly our care, can change it. 

It is a ripple effect. We do not realize how much power we have to influence the world.

I am not trying to imply that I am perfect. That I am smiling all the time. Because life happens. But if we all try to see our own selves, we begin see others. Who knows, perhaps then there would be less crime, less children abused or suffering, less wars. Because if you think about it — is not the "evil" person just hurting? What if someone had treated them better or shown them kindness and love throughout their lives? What if someone would have seen them? What if it had healed something in those people, and they would not have become who they are now? Without pain, without ignorance, perhaps those seemingly unsolvable problems in our world would not even happen.

I am not saying that whatever I paint is 100% right for everyone. All is subjective. I am not saying that I perhaps do not unconsciously influence my work, or that my paintings are not shaped by my own experiences. But I still believe. I believe in a better world. I believe that society can change. I believe that kindness and love — not only toward others but toward ourselves — can happen. And these simple principles, together with a willingness to see and the bravery to stand for what is true, are the answer to our problems.

This is my WHY.

Why I do this. Why I paint. Why I write. This is why I am doing the SEE YOU project. 

This is Why I am interested in showing people through commissions that in kindness we are all beautiful, that those masks and our perceptions of selves are false. And that is perhaps also why I am so deeply grateful that all the poetry, that my Greek goddesses arrive — and they show to the world that every journey is unique and it is okay to fall. We very often just need that one friend, that one person, who shows us kindness. Who sees something in us worth fighting for. 

And then, with this, the whole world suddenly becomes lighter and brighter.

Call me naïve. Call me a dreamer. Whatever you say is okay. But if this speaks to you, please know that you are beautiful in your authenticity and kindness.Please know that you are unique, that you can influence far more things than you realize. And that you can do whatever you decide to do, if you believe it. And please know, that the world is a far better place with you in it. 

What comes through in this final conversation is the care required to paint another person’s story without taking it from them.

Simona Ray describes commission work as a form of deep listening. Not listening for facts, or biography, or the version of someone they present to the world, but for the emotional truth beneath it. The strength they cannot see. The beauty they distrust. The gap between who they are and who they have been taught to perform.

That kind of work demands openness, but also boundaries. Ray is clear that not every story is hers to hold, and not every connection is one she can safely enter. This honesty gives the work its depth. It is not about artistic possession. It is about trust.

Across the interview, portraiture becomes something larger than image-making. It becomes a kind of witness. A way of saying that a person’s inner world matters enough to be seen with patience and care.

As the series closes, Ray returns to the question that has shaped so much of her work: do we truly see each other? Her answer is not loud or simple, but it is deeply felt. We can. But only if we are willing to stop performing long enough to look.