When Anat Ronen came to the United States from Israel, she and her husband wanted a different life. She had been working in various office jobs and living in a Kibbutz, and knew it was time to pursue another direction. So they moved to Houston, Texas, where she now spends her life as a mural artist and graphic designer.
Deciding to Move from Israel to Texas
Although she enjoyed drawing and painting as a child, Ronen was not encouraged to pursue the arts by her mother and father. In a recent phone interview she revealed, "My parents never... really encouraged me to do something with it. So I grew up with the attitude that even if I knew how to draw better than others... it didn’t matter. I had to go to school and do the regular stuff and that became my life. No encouragement to follow my natural talent."
But after a decade of living a "normal life," Ronen and her husband decided to make a change. She stated, "At the age of 35, we figured maybe it was time to do something we really want, five minutes before it's too late... And we decided to come here."
It was important for them to do it right and legal. They needed to find a way to stay, but be independent. The couple learned about the different Visa options, and decided to go for an extraordinary ability Visa. And so she gathered examples of all the artwork she created over the years for friends, charity, work and family and sent them in with her application. The Visa was granted based on her talent, but now she faced the real life challenge of actually making a living out of it.
She immediately began placing ads on Craigslist and other local directories. In the last two years she has completed over 100 murals and has a client list that includes Dr. Pepper and Neiman Marcus.
Anat Ronen's First Mural Was Dangerous
Ronen's first public mural was a challenge in many ways. The artist was not only launching a new business, a difficult task on its own, but the job was physically dangerous as well. She recounted, "I got called from a company that does highway painting… They often offer something artistic to their project. For example, they paint the highway and they add a little bit of emblems or stars or whatever is connected to the local freeway that they paint."
The company's regular artist was unavailable and hired her to paint a mural on the highway. Her artwork, created on the main road out to the island of Galveston, depicted the marshes and the beaches of the area. She described the job saying, "It was a brand new causeway. I had to paint 100 feet of wall in between the median, the wall in between the lanes. It was really difficult, and dangerous, and surreal to just stand there in the middle of people driving by at 65 miles an hour… Looking back, I don’t know how I could do it. Not knowing is a blessing, I guess."
Anat Ronen Always Puts the Client First
Ronen declared that she always puts the customer first when she is first hired to create a mural. Her initial consideration for any mural is the location, but beyond that she strives to achieve "whatever the client has in mind." She added that she thinks about, "Who needs to look at it? What do you need to deliver and what kind of message the client wants to deliver? That's very important."
She noted that her business background greatly affects how she approaches her art. She pointed out, "As a business owner when I design, when I meet people, I'm always thinking about their end as well. Obviously, I want to make a living, but they want to spend the least possible. So you need to meet in between."
She went on to say that she does not just create art for art's sake. "I'm not the typical artist who would do just whatever I want and charge whatever without seeing the world around me. This is not the way to work. In that specific niche that I am in, you have to make sure that what you do, first of all, benefits the business owner because otherwise you have no reason to exist."
Anat Ronen Wants to Bring Nature Back to Houston
Ronen said that there is one ultimate goal she has in mind when it comes to murals. She acknowledged, "Houston is very big and very paved. There's a lot of roads. There's a lot of concrete. There's a lot of civilized structure… Houston is not that pretty, so adding a little bit of color and more nature whenever I'm requested to is really fun because we're adding something that we took away."
As an unschooled artist there are always challenges, but she faces them head on and never backs down. She admitted, "I would love to be requested to do a big building somewhere. The thing is it's funny, because I never learned how to do it, and every time they ask me for something I never did before like a big, big wall or a very high building… I need to learn how to do it. I need to figure out how to conquer that wall... On one hand I really wish I had a big wall on the other hand I'm a little bit afraid of that. So whatever comes at me, I’ll just take it."
Ronen confessed, "My main dream is to be able to live here in the United States, make a living and be happy."
Anat Ronen's work can be seen throughout the Houston, Texas area.
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