How Andrea Eichelberg Turns Life Experiences Into Colourful Abstract Paintings

At Women in Arts Network, Love, Life and Everything She Creates brought together artists who pour their whole selves into what they make. It is an edition devoted to the idea that art is never separate from the life behind it that every canvas carries the loves, losses, questions, and quiet joys of the woman who made it. Among the many remarkable voices it gathered, one name stood out simply by being a philosophy in itself.

Andrea Eichelberg is one of our selected artists, and she paints as LIBWA short for Life Is Better with Art. For Andrea this is not merely a motto, but the way she has chosen to live: to meet the world with colour in one hand and gratitude in the other, and to make, out of everything life brings, something joyful.

Andrea’s love of color began in childhood. Her father ran a small painting and decorating business, and their home was full of color cards, wallpaper sample books, and leftover materials from his projects. With limited resources, imagination mattered all the more, and frequent museum visits sparked a lifelong appreciation for art.

Her process is fast, intuitive, and unafraid of accident. Working mainly in acrylics perfect, she admits, for someone not blessed with patience she never begins with a finished image in mind, but with a feeling or a question, sometimes as large as what it means to belong far from home. She works on about five paintings at once, chasing “what if”: what if she cut this out, printed on it, stitched into it.

Unexpected twists and even failures, she has learned, are often the best discoveries, and when a painting gets stuck, she treats it like a season in nature, shifting to mixed media until fresh ideas return. Colour sits at the heart of it all. Over time her palette has matured, each tone carrying symbolic weight, because a good life, she believes, means embracing all its colours the joyful and the difficult alike.

Some paintings even begin in a sad or thoughtful place, and it is in laying layer over layer that she comes to terms with them. What shines through, in the end, is her nature: the conviction that despite every challenge, she has a choice, and she chooses joy, optimism, and gratitude.

Let’s get to know Andrea through our conversation with her about color, the story behind LIBWA, and trusting your instincts as a self-taught artist.

Q1. Could you take us back to the beginning of your creative journey and share what first inspired you to start painting?

My father ran a small painting and decorating business, and our home was filled with color cards, wallpaper sample books, and leftover materials from his projects. My parents encouraged creativity and with limited resources, imagination was even more important. Countless visits to museums of sparked a lifelong appreciation for art. With a job in a corporation, I went astray for years. It was decades later when I visited an art show which was a full immersion into color and texture that I exclaimed: I need more color in my life! This was the moment I started painting.

Q2. Your artist name, LIBWA ‘Life Is Better With Art’ is such a positive statement. When did that become more than a motto and start reflecting the way you live your life?

LIBWA started out as a nickname given to me by a friend after I did him a favor. When he thanked me I told him that for my friends Life Is Better With Andrea (my first name). Next, we went to a coffee shop and when the barista asked for whom the order is my friend said ‘It´s for Libwa‘. This name has remained with me and when years later I was looking for an artist name, it was a natural choice to pick LIBWA.

Now with the A as an acronym for Art. It´s important to know that this friend also has been one of the first supporters of my art, being the first buyer of my work. – My paintings are created to spread joy and spark conversations. Creating art and sourrounding yourself with art makes life much more beautiful and inspiring.

Q3. You work mainly with acrylics and have recently started exploring mixed media. What has that shift allowed you to discover in your work?

I am not a very patient person – hence acrylics works perfectly for me because they dry fast. In my art practice experimentation and play are important: that´s when I follow ‘what if‘ questions. What if I cut this out and glued it together, what if I added a printed element or stitched on it. Unexpected twists and failures are often the best discoveries. Next to that, let´s be honest: I get stuck with paintings. I have learned to accept it as a normal cycle, like seasons in nature. If I shift to other media, I stay active and it helps me to get unstuck and I return to my paintings after some time with refreshing ideas, adding depth to my paintings.

Q4. You often describe your process as intuitive and fast. What do you enjoy about making decisions in the moment instead of carefully planning every step?

I never have a finished painting in mind when I start. Instead, I start with a feeling or a question. This can be a big question like ‘What makes be belong when I live away from my home country‘ or just listening to my emotion of the day. This determines the palette, the first movements. I usually work on about 5 paintings of the same series at the same time. I decide on a brushstroke and move on the the next one.

By following this process, my art remains more playful and raw. I stay more grounded in the notion I started with and don´t get hang up on details too early. After many layers, different twists, there starts to emerge an individual character for each painting. Only then I get more into an editing mode to bring out the final work. I only determine a title once a painting is finished.

Q5. Travel and memories are recurring sources of inspiration for you. Is there a particular place that has found its way into your work again and again?

I enjoy going to places I haven ‘t been before and to learn about different cultures. Living in different countries and having friends from all over the world has certainly rubbed off on me. I constantly take photos of things from the near and far that caught my interest: movement, forms, color combinations. Next to that encounters and experiences are an important inspiration, as well as concepts like the South African ubuntu and Japanese wabi Sabi.

Q6. Your work celebrates colour in a very confident way. Has your relationship with colour changed as you’ve grown as an artist?

Color is essential in my art, and in my life. Mixing colors to make them sing together more harmoniously has certainly changed over time. Different tones in my paintings also carry a more symbolic meaning. Life is a complex thing: living a good and joyful life means to embrace all the colors it brings, the good and the challenging experiences. My color choices have become more mature – but I still and always will love a good orange-blue combo.

Q7. Your paintings often radiate energy and optimism. Do you consciously choose to create joyful work, or does that feeling naturally emerge while you’re painting?

Some of my paintings start from a more thoughtful or even sad place. Painting reveals what is really going on inside without the limitations of finding words for it. What I put out with paint and marks comes from the heart and by exploring these notions by laying layers over layers on the canvas, I come to better terms with the situation. I think my very nature comes through in my work that despite the challenges and frustrations we all experience, I have a choice and I choose joy, optimism and gratitude.

Q8. Looking back at your earliest paintings, what do you think they reveal about the artist you were becoming?

In one of my earliest paintings I revealed hidden layers with a painting knife. That search for what´s behind, what is not revealing at first sight has remained with me and my art. They were also driven by curiosity.

Q9. More artists today are building careers outside traditional gallery systems. Has that independence given you greater creative freedom?

There are so many fantastic artists on this planet and only a certain amount of galleries. Getting my art out even in unusual settings allowed me to gain more visibility beyond the traditional art gallery settings. Galleries are important. Yet, there are many more ways to showcase art and to engage with people who are interested in art.

Q10. Looking back, what achievement has meant the most to you—not because of recognition, but because of what it represented personally?

In the midst of my preparation for my first solo exhibition I accepted a job offer to go to Boston (from Germany). It cut my preparation time down by 3 months. I poured my paintings out early in the morning before going to my corporate job and late in the evening after I returned from home. I finished everything in time before

I flew out. I had to fly back to Germany a few months later to be at the opening reception of my solo show. Seeing my paintings on display in a strong and cohesive show made me feel very proud, especially because of the extra resilience it took to accomplish this milestone.

Q11. Is there something you’ve always wanted to explore in your work but haven’t had the chance to pursue yet?

I really would love to go for a very large scale painting. My current studio space has limitations but one day I‘ll find a way.

Q12. What advice would you give to artists who are self-taught and are still learning to trust their own instincts?

I am a self-taught artist too. We learn by doing, by experimenting. It´s better to try things out and fail than to not try it at all. Failure opens new ways. Book a workshop with an artist you admire, go and see shows. Connect with local creative people. Most importantly, establish a regular art practice. Scribble, paint, draw without the need to be a finished artwork. A daily sketchbook page was a game changer for me.

As our time with Andrea wrapped up, we kept coming back to color, and to everything it quietly holds for her: feeling, memory, and the daily decision to meet life beautifully.

It is one of the most human things there is, the way we reach for something bright on our hardest days. A song, a walk, a splash of color on a grey afternoon. Andrea’s work lives right inside that instinct. Not every painting begins in happiness; some start somewhere heavier, in a mood or a worry she cannot put into words.

And rather than tidy that away, she works it through the only way she knows, laying color over color until the canvas arrives somewhere she can breathe again. There is something honest in that, and something quietly brave. She is not insisting that life is easy, or that pain does not exist. She is simply deciding, again and again, that joy is worth choosing. Her work reminds us that optimism is not about ignoring the hard parts of life, but about what we choose to make out of them.

There is something worth noticing about where the art world is heading, too. More and more, images can be produced and perfected in an instant, endless, spotless, and identical. Andrea’s work goes the other way entirely. She paints fast and by feel, chasing “what if”, welcoming the accidents and the detours, letting each canvas find its own character through layer after imperfect layer. It would be easy to call that messy. We think it is exactly what a polished, automated world is quietly missing, the fingerprints of a real person, the charm of the unplanned, and the warmth of something that could only ever have come from one pair of hands.

For art lovers and collectors, that is what makes her work so rare. Each painting is a one-of-a-kind record of instinct and experiment, alive with color and impossible to repeat. To bring one into your home is to keep a little of that brightness close, a gentle, everyday reminder to embrace all the colors life offers, the easy ones and the difficult ones, and to choose beauty regardless.

Follow Andrea Eichelberg through the links below and see her work for yourself.