Quilling with Nella Romanova

Recently while checking out a link on You Tube, I noticed a video on the sidebar that featured what looked like a quilled bird... intrigued, I clicked on it and am so glad I did, as I was quickly introduced to Nella Romanova of Australia.

Quilled Phoenix

She designed this lovely, large, and densely coiled phoenix and tree as a Grade 12 school project and talks about it in the video, and has also posted another one which is a tutorial on her self-taught, finger-rolling quilling method. I hope you'll take a moment to enjoy charismatic Nella's videos. The first one is a bit pixelated, but still very watchable. [Edit: the videos are no longer available.]

I contacted Nella for permission to share her work here and she agreed to answer a few questions about it.

How did you happen to discover quilling?

I discovered quilling when I was thinking of ideas for my art major in the last year of high school. I had an idea of creating a very large artwork which was different to what anyone else had done, and remembered the work of Yulia Brodskaya who is actually my inspiration. Her art is absolutely amazing. I decided to put my own spin on it by creating the whole image out of quilled swirls.

What do you like about quilling?

I like quilling because it's such a creative way of creating an image using different coloured paper, and there is a real 3D aspect to it. There are so many ways to do it and it can make any image look very beautiful.

Quilled Dolphin

Are you an art major at university and are you planning to pursue an artistic career?
At university I'm actually studying law, however my passions are creative things such as art and acting. I don't plan to study art at university or pursue it as a career because, like all artists, I sometimes don't have the motivation to work on a particular project. Art as a hobby is a lot more free and you can create anything, any time!

What is your favorite artistic medium?I love using plain pencils to draw portraits; it's one of my strengths. This is one I've recently been working on. However, I also enjoy working with coloured paper, especially to create quilling projects and other paper craft like scrapbooks and cards - I always make my own cards for people's birthdays and celebrations.

Thanks Nella, for being such a good ambassador of quilling and for sharing your talent and sense of humor via your videos. Best success to you!