Where It Began
I grew up in Ogre, Latvia, where I first found my way into art through school classes and after-school activities. Back then, I experimented more than I understood — pouring paint, taking photographs, mastering Adobe Photoshop skills, trying things without really knowing what I was looking for. I wasn’t “good” yet. I was restless. A little lost. But something was already there.
When I moved to Norway, everything changed. For the first time, I had space — mentally and physically — to slow down. In 2017, while spending only the summer there, I picked up my first set of acrylic paints. Until then, I had never truly had the chance to paint.
Alongside my work as an artist, I followed a different path in my studies. In 2021, I graduated from the Riga Graduate School of Law with a degree in Business and Law. I am now completing my degree in Digital Forensics at Noroff University College in Norway.
This contrast — between structure and intuition, logic and instinct — quietly influences how I work. One part of me searches for patterns, systems, and truth. The other expresses feeling, memory, and atmosphere. My art exists somewhere in between.
Boredom became my doorway into creativity — and stress became its quiet companion. Painting gave me a way to slow my thoughts, to shift my focus from what I couldn’t control to what I could shape. Sometimes it wasn’t about creating something beautiful, but about creating space to breathe.
The Dual Identity
I work under two voices — Beate Nilsen × Bjata — not as separate identities, but as two ways of seeing, feeling, and translating the same inner world. My focus has moved toward building series, developing my own visual language, and creating work that comes from my own ideas rather than borrowed ones.
What I paint now is not about learning how to paint.
It’s about learning how to speak.
Beate Nilsen explores contrast — between strength and softness, presence and absence, silence and expression. My paintings begin with tension, but they don’t stay there. Using layered colors, evolving shapes, and concealed faces, I explore what lies beneath the surface instead of what is immediately visible.
Bjata is the rawer side of my work. Less polished, more honest. It allows space for imperfection, vulnerability, and raw presence.
Together, these two identities let me navigate between control and freedom, design and feeling, structure and intuition, creating a balanced harmony within myself.
Every piece invites you—not necessarily to understand, but to engage and explore it in your own way.
First Light — Summer 2017
It was summer. Warm air, sunlight on the terrace, and a blank canvas in front of me.
I didn’t know how to handle heavy acrylics. I didn’t know the rules, the techniques, or what I was “supposed” to do.
So I didn’t think about any of it.
I tested what I could and couldn’t control. I painted without worrying about being good or bad. In my mind, doing something felt better than doing nothing.
This painting isn’t perfect. I don’t think any of my work ever is.
I don’t believe a painting is something you finish — only something you eventually step away from.
Contact
Location
Bergen, Norway
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