After coming to Ames from Warsaw, Poland to get her doctorate’s degree in biology, local artist Monika Pate decided to shift gears and focus instead on one of her favorite pastimes, drawing.

It was something she had mastered, but never thought of doing professionally, until her husband saw a real talent in her.

“I discovered painting by accident,” Pate says. “I had always loved to draw, and one day my husband asked me if I had ever taken art classes.”

Pate decided to take a few classes and found a love for watercolors, even though she had never used paint for her work.

She says it quickly became an obsession.

“I found the watercolor technique so interesting that I began to paint for eight to 10 hours a day,” Pate says.

Pate loves to incorporate vibrant colors in her work.

“I like to use really bright colors and a lot of colors to add detail to the paintings,” she says.

Finding beauty in nature and transforming real life objects into watercolor expressions is an art that Pate says she strives to achieve.

She describes her work as being realistic and she likes to use either still-life objects or other things found in nature. Pate says she pays close attention to the way that sunlight shines down on these objects.

“Before I paint, I think about the contrast between the sunlight and the shadows with the object in whatever I paint,” she says.

Since Pate began painting 11 years ago, she says her style has changed because she easily gets tired doing the same techniques all the time.

“I get bored and like to try new things,” Pate says.

Trying new things can mean painting things that people wouldn’t normally think to paint.

“I like to paint what I see,” she says. “Once I painted tomatoes because I think they look interesting, and are a challenge to paint. Or once I painted cabbage because I like the colors in it and thought it looked pretty.”

One technique Pate has discovered is working with layers.

First, she plans in her head what she wants the piece to look like. Then she will start with a layer of paint and add to it to create the picture.

Pate believes watercolor is one of the most difficult mediums to master, and that people often wonder how she gets her colors to be so vibrant. She says it’s just working hard at what she likes to do.

“I want people to see that there is beauty and interest in everything,” she says.

An exhibit of Pate’s paintings is being shown in the Memorial Union until July 5 in the second floor gallery.