Sarajevo, Oct 28 (BUS): Nada Rodan has felt more comfortable drawing, a skill she discovered at age 87 and culminated this summer in an exhibition of her artwork – for her 100th birthday.
Bosnian-born Rodan said she started drawing at a late age to keep busy and now finds the days are often too short to fit in with whatever she plans to do, Reuters reports.
Her daily routine is to draw for three hours in the morning and two hours in the afternoon when she’s at home.
“I don’t know what boredom means, I don’t know what depression means, I always find something to do,” she says.
Her independent spirit, good health and love for travel help.
After her exhibition in Sarajevo in late June, Rodin left for a month-long vacation on the Adriatic coast and then traveled to Germany, where her daughter lives.
“I am determined not to become a burden on my children,” a mother of two, a grandmother of three and a grandmother of four told Reuters in her spacious home in central Sarajevo.
“I’m calm, I don’t want to be nervous, I always think first and then act,” says Rodin, who’s made a living as a seamstress, and continues to “pick clients” until she’s 85.
“I am still healthy, my hands are stable, my eyes serve me well,” she says, adding that she rarely wears glasses when painting.
She speaks fondly of the frequent trips with her children and grandchildren over the past decades.
After her husband’s death in 1999, Rodin visited the United States, Central America, and many European countries, and those trips inspired many of her paintings, such as a volcano in Hawaii or the pyramids in Mexico.
She visited Hollywood at the age of 95, and was allowed to enter the theater where the Oscars are held. “That was fun!”
Rodin loves painting nature more than anything else and uses acrylic colors “because they don’t smell”.
She considers herself an “amateur” and not a “real artist”, but she is very proud that all her family, friends and neighbors attended her exhibition.
“You have to be positive in life and hope for the best, there will always be a solution,” says Rodin, who survived World War II and the 1992-1995 siege of Sarajevo.