“Look! Look! That's my Daddy's painting!”

Inspired by his daughter, this accomplished artistquit his day job to follow his dreams.

- Aaron Gan

As a boy, Aaron Gan dreamt of being a professional artist. While other children wanted to grow up to become doctors, lawyers, firefighters or the president, deep inside he knew that his calling was to be an artist.

“Ever since I could hold a pencil, I was always drawing. My mum is still telling stories of how my kindergarten teachers always asked her if she has been doing my drawing assignments for me,” says Aaron.

High school came and went. While Aaron stopped learning art as a formal subject when he reached 14, he continued to carry a sketchbook wherever he went and drew whenever he could. “Art was therapeutic for me,” he says.

Aaron’s love for landscape painting, particularly nature, grew during his university days at the University of Western Australia. “We were surrounded by beauty everyday. We had a beautiful clock tower, Swan Lake was at our doorstep and peacocks crossed our paths as we walked to class,” he says with a smile.

By age 33, he has become an accomplished watercolour artist.

People say that your life changes once you become a father. That was true for Aaron. Although he had been running his own business successfully for several years, he never gave up on his childhood dream. “I felt that as a father, I should one day be able to look at my daughter in the eyes and tell her that life is for living, and that she owes it to herself to live out her dreams,”he says. With that conviction in mind, Aaron closed down his business and plunged headlong into the arts.