Everyday artist of the week

Pieter Egriega from Cheshire shared a photo of his first painting after having a stroke. We contacted him to find out more about his story.

Peter Egriega used painting to recover after his stroke

If you haven’t got any kind of creative outlet for yourself, you haven’t got the drive to achieve after something like a stroke

For work I run a small business, we make apps for schools. But I had always been creative, making music, painting, writing.

In 2013 I had a massive stroke and lost a lot of mobility in my right side. I started writing a book in hospital afterwards, as I had to do something. I am desperate to get back to painting more, but my arm doesn’t do what it used to.

There is a lot of self-reflection that goes on post stroke, and I am looking at myself and trying to find what makes me, ‘me’. Rembrandt painted himself as he got older, and I like that idea, of using your facilities to represent who you are. In a few months I will have more time, and when the canvases come out I think I will probably paint myself more.

I was given a Life After Stroke award for Creative Arts by the Stroke Association. I think it is a really profound thing, that if you haven’t got any kind of creative outlet for yourself, you haven’t got the drive to achieve after something like a stroke.

If you want to do creative things then inevitably you are going to want to recover so that you can still do them. I wanted to communicate in so many different ways before the stroke, and I am determined not to lose any of them.