The light we chase
"The Mediterranean has colors like Mackerel. Changeable I mean. You don't know if it is green or violet, you can't even say it is blue, because the next moment the changing light has taken on a tinge of pink or gray." -V Van Gogh Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, c. June 4, 1888
That's what Van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo, his patron and best friend, in one of his letters. For many years, this book- Letters to Theo, lived on my nightstand and my heart. Every once in awhile, I would pick it up again and read a random page which is an inquiry into his heart and an understanding his dreams, desires and struggles . Some sentences burrow into the deepest corners of my heart and memory unknowingly, only to surface again when you least expect them, as I stumble through my life.
Someday, I will write about Van Gogh's letters to Theo in detail. But today, my friends, let's talk about the Mediterranean, and particularly about Croatia and its beautiful Adriatic coastline.
Van Gogh never went to Croatia. Nor did I know that I would understand his words so viscerally until I returned from my trip and looked at my digital pictures of quick plein air sketches. Only then did I realize the magic in those unpretentious words I had read many years ago.
But for impatient minds, before we talk about light, let me tell you a little about our trip.
A winding pathway that led us to a hidden pizzeria in Rovinj.
Authentic over Synthetic
We chose October to travel, because we are budget travelers. Although Dubrovnik was big draw when initially planning our trip, we never made it all the way there!
DISCLAIMER: Big Game of Thrones fan here, and I wish I had the time and resources to visit there before the Sansa and Cersi did. We were traveling Croatia without much plan and by the time we reached Hvar our hearts were so filled with the beauty of people, food, culture and nature, we wanted to quit at the high point before getting carried away by scripted moments .
We learnt our lesson amidst the dazzling blue domes of Santorini. There we were greeted by the spectacle of young women in rented bridal gowns (and often no grooms!) posing for endless selfies. The sight laid bare the empty choreography of modern tourism. A genuine experience reduced to a commodity in hopes of distant digital applause. With authenticity evaporated and replaced by synthetic ritual, it bordered on self-parody.
We were afraid we might be in for more of the same at the home of King's Landing... The unique, authentic feeling of "being there" is eroded by constant reproduction and commodification. Travelers taking selfies, repeatedly trying to relive a scripted experience—some influencer's choreographed moment—rather than discovering something personal and new.
An almost empty Dubovica beach with a family still had their restaurant open.
We tried to find less touristy and more affordable spaces, and we were not disappointed. Being late in the season, Rovinj, Zadar, Trogir, Split, Hvar, and even at the immensely popular Plitvice National Park, lines were shorter and relatively uncrowded. Our planning was last-minute, yet we secured excellent bookings on Booking.com at very reasonable costs. Restaurants were relaxed and welcoming. Hosts were nice and helpful. Also we decided to rent a car in order to get to the remote places.
To me Croatia is like the Taj Mahal—the dreamy towns are endlessly photographed, but when you actually visit them, they're even more beautiful than you imagined. But before we get into l’exploration l’artistique, here's the short summary of our itinerary:
Start Point: Lisbon, Portugal ✈️
Day 1: ✈️ Flight Lisbon → Milan
- Cheap, comfortable EasyJet flight.
- Benefit of EU based travel: no jet lag, spontaneous trips.
- Rented a hybrid car from terminal 2 weeks
- Day 1 (continued): 🚗 Drive Milan → Rovinj (Croatia)
- Long, confusing drive with border construction delays.
- ⚠️ Note to self: Don’t rely solely on Google Maps for travel time estimates, they're always wrong!
- Days 2–3: 🌅 Rovinj (2 nights)
- “Heaven start to end.” this ended up being one of our favs
- Perfect coastal town to unwind after travel fatigue.
- Day 4: 🏛️ Stop in Pula
- Colosseum more photogenic than Rome’s.
- Continue to Plitvice (another long, construction-delayed drive).
- Days 5–6: 🌿 Plitvice Lakes National Park
- 2 days in pristine nature, just in time to watch the leaves change color, totally off the grid.
- Day 7: 🌇 Zadar
- Short drive from Plitvice, magical sunsets.
- Days 8–9: 🏖️ Trogir
- Perfect sunsets! Close enough to drive into Split for easy day trips and return to get away from the crowds.
- Days 10–12: 🛥️ Hvar Island
- 3 nights; beautiful, rivaling Rovinj’s charm.
- Days 13–14: 🇸🇮 Slow drive back Milan via Slovenia
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Scenic, relaxed return through mountain valleys.
- Day 15 : Back to Lisbon
One of the main reasons not to visit Dubrovnik (as mentioned above), was saving time for long drive back to Milan and reserving it for next time. This aligned with our overall goal of not merely checking boxes. We wanted to stay away from what becomes a ritualized performance of tourism.
l’exploration l’artistique
So back to my journey as an artist. This blog came along only after returning to Lisbon, when I reviewed my own photographs alongside the actual paintings I'd made, I realized that unlike any of my previous forays into plein air, this time I had managed to capture something different... a quality somehow closer to reality in hue and expression of light.
Sitting at a Lisbon café, looking through the sketchbook, my heart filled with pride. I have done larger and more challenging paintings over the last ten years—awarded, exhibited, sold works, each with its own moments of validation. But this was different.
Something had finally aligned after what seemed like ages. All those years of art practice—the plein air discipline, the realism studies, the mixed media explorations—had been preparing me without my knowing it. Then came the last difficult few years, a gap that felt like loss but was actually gestation. The unease with corporate life, the frustration of abandoned canvases in Chicago, loss of loved ones the growing urgency to reclaim what I'd set aside.
I'd been carrying all of this—the skills, the hunger, the readiness—through airports and obligations, waiting for the right canvas to present itself. And then Croatia did. The inspiration wasn't something I found; it found me. Or perhaps more accurately, I had finally become available to be found. When technique meets longing meets opportunity, art doesn't just happen—it erupts. After a year of drought, I was suddenly painting again, and it felt less like remembering how and more like remembering who I was.
"Light is nothing that can be reproduced but must be represented by something else—color." Cezanne
In these six small works, I finally understood what he meant. I was no longer trying to reproduce light or images; I was just channeling it without much thought. And so I decided to share this journey for what it is.
Armed with a limited set of broken Sennelier pastels for a palette, I chased nature's perfection, and came close to Van Gogh's mackerel-like Mediterranean colors on my sketchbook.
It took me about 60 minutes each and when I stopped, I was amazed by the results. They were amazing in my own eyes and I didn't care.
So let's begin with Rovinj.
Rovinj
Rovinj (pronounced "Rovin") is a very close second place as a favorite town in Croatia for me, brimming with natural and man-made beauty. After that long drive from Milan, Rovinj was our first stop—a beautiful dream that I both slept in and woke up to.
We visited in mid-October. Parking in the old town isn't permitted, so we dragged our 20-kilogram suitcase through pristine marble walkways bathed in full moonlight. I was afraid the roller wheels would leave scratches on those beautifully clean marble cobblestones.
A Full Moon Night in Rovinj. Watch closely and you will hear the music.
It was about 9 PM, with a chill in the air. We were in the last stretch—a week or two before most of Croatia's tourist spots close for fall and winter. We checked into our third-floor room after climbing 36 steep steps, exhausted. But we came right back down to immerse ourselves in the beautiful space this town offered. We were essentially on a small island with perfect elevation and medieval structural components that have rarely been touched over the past many centuries.
Very few tourists still lingered in the moon-bathed alleys as we walked out of our apartment looking for the waterfront. It was a sight for the senses—a musician playing live music that perfectly blended with the cool moonlight touching everything in its grasp. A small sprinklingrof tourists still occupied the waterside restaurants offering deliciously aromatic seafood dishes. Van Gogh found the light at night more vivid and expressive than daylight, and I understood exactly what he meant.
We chose an alley we thought would take us to the church at the top of the hill, little knowing it would wind us through the most beautiful parts of the city. It was 10 PM and some of the art galleries were still open. I met really nice, warm, and welcoming people from Croatia there.
These rooftop colors and the composition bring so much joy to my heart.
Sometime during the night, those images made their mark. I woke up possessed by a clarity I hadn't felt in months—those rusty pastels and my half-finished sketchbook were coming out of my travel bag, and they were coming out today. The canvas of Rovinj had issued a challenge I couldn't ignore. My hands needed to move. But determination and destination are different things—I had no idea where I would rediscover my forgotten plein air skills. I just walked. Within minutes, Rovinj answered. As I stood considering a particular view, a group of elegant older French women positioned themselves behind me and began photographing the exact same scene. They saw it too. This was my spot.
Croatia finally opened the door to my creative room that had been locked for almost a year.
This is where I broke my spell - the Rovinj
I started sketching next to an outdoor restaurant that hadn't yet opened. I opened the pastel box and in the next 45 minutes took home the memory of what I saw. I don't remember what happened in those 45 minutes—only that they felt eternal and instantaneous at once.
The Rovinj waiter, waiting for his first morning customer, graciously allowed me to sit at his outdoor dining space and continue painting. That was an honor. I ordered wine and a caprese salad and gave my painting its finishing touches.
What emerged was beyond my own expectations... and I felt a sense of satishfaction! that I hadn't felt in a long time. In a world where OnlyFans members are called "creators"- (they should be called entrepeneurs, IMO), this felt like a real, true expression. I come from a time when we still reserved that word for those who actually create something that wasn't in existence before. The human body already exists; merely flaunting it is not creation. Even a bot can do that.
After Rovinj, I decided to get disciplined—to draw en plein air at each location we visited, however imperfect it might be. I gave myself only one prerequisite: the composition had to speak to my heart. The canvas of Croatia was so inspiring that there was no dearth of compelling compositions.
Plitvice Park
Above Pula - 2051 years of glory!
A night before the third day in Rovinj, we finally figured out the parking situation and a roundabout way to get the car closer to our apartment in the historical town. We dragged our suitcase a shorter distance this time, packed the car with groceries, and headed toward Plitvice.
We stopped at 'Pula' along the way to see the colosseum. It's remarkably preserved, and - unlike in Rome, the blank backdrop of the blue Mediterranean sky is stunning.
Standing there, I was reminded of the last time I'd seen a colosseum—with my mom, dad, and sister twenty years ago. So much has changed since then. It had seen so much – emperors and beasts, kings and kingdoms, come and gone. We were standing there like two little blips in the life of a colosseum. Blip. Blip.
Pula is a decent city (though it's hard to compete with Rovinj) with a great waterfront. We wandered around to see the Roman forum, a beautiful building that cameras can't quite capture. But that detour added an hour to our drive and proved critical as we approached Plitvice Park in fading light.
The park area is enormous (like US national parks), and there are two roads leading to the main gate where our accommodation was located. Both wind through valleys on narrow mountain roads—one side pressed against rock face, the other dropping into darkness. It reminded me of those Himalayan truck-driving shows.
We arrived in pitch-black night, but our room had a back patio with a front-row view of the stars- shooting stars, fast-moving satellites zipping past. There was a chill in the air, and we huddled together on the porch wrapped in blankets and holding sipping hot cup noodles soups. Two blips watching uncountable blips steak across the sky.
I'm a city person. I love urban life access to supermarkets, connectivity, the hum of civilization. Nature trips and hiking aren't really my cup of tea—in my youth, I always returned with some damage to my limbs. Plus, I don't like being unreachable for prolonged periods.
From a long-distance caregiving perspective, it's not feasible. With aging parents, one is always waiting for that call that can spin your travel plans on their axis – emotionally and physically.
A couple of years ago, my father passed away just as we'd reached a small village in Switzerland. The next 48 hours—managing my loss and the frantic journey back to Mumbai—left me with a kind of PTSD. Now, whenever I plan trips to remote locations, I always have an exit strategy mapped out. But I'm sure most of us are in that caregiving-self-care phase where we want to see the world before it's too late, even as we remain tethered to responsibilities.
How to care for your aging parents when you life continent away : Long Distance Caregiving
Plitvice is where nature performs its most patient architecture. Sixteen cascading lakes connected by waterfalls create a symphony of water that has carved its way through limestone and dolomite for millennia. The color of the water shifts from emerald to azure to turquoise depending on mineral content and the angle of light.
Even in October, the park was busy. Asian, Italians, locals more less Americans—all lined up in the morning. They let us in thirty minutes before our ticket time, and then the parade began: camera warriors, influencers with tripods, tour groups from massive buses, all flowing through the narrow boardwalks built for maybe one-and-a-half people at a time.
A warning: there are four or five different trails, and the signage is more confusing than at the Charles de Gaulle Airport. We took Trail C, I think, but it didn't really matter—they all intersect at various junctures, sending you in seemingly wrong directions like some elaborate Korean game show where contestants fight for survival.
But it wasn't a joke for me. My blood sugar was dropping rapidly. The walks average at least five hours minimum, not including waiting for boat rides, getting lost, and being stuck behind selfie-taking influencers, bird feeding (not allowed) nature lovers, spouses mistaking their spouses as models, oblivious to the backed-up line behind them. Even in that low blood sugar lost in the wood’s situation, I stopped for a couple of testy multi-lingual exchanges between complete strangers.
I'm usually a super planner, but I was misinformed about food availability. I was told there were food stalls everywhere in the park. Trust me, there are none except at one or two main entrances. Once you're on a trail, you're in a maze—an amazingly beautiful maze where you lose track of time. We (along with many others like us) eventually found our way back to the main area with multiple eating options where I over ate like a starving person.
Wise note: pack substantial food when you're on the trail. It's common sense, but I missed it.
That evening we stopped at a restaurant recommended by our hostess and famous Croation delicacies.
Between managing my sugar and crowds, I decided not to paint at the park as I was physically exhausted. But the next day morning I kept my promise. From the back balcony, painted the view that at night was showered with stars and satellites.
Next day morning, twice beaten by the google maps lead traffic jams we left about 9AM on. Sunday morning. To our surprise, we reached to Zadar in 90 mins. Lesson learnt. For road trip in Croatia – there is no day like Sunday. You don’t drive, you fly. And there is no construction.
Zadar
There is something about the name Zadar that sounds warrior like. But it is pretty chill town. The attractions are pretty new and man-made on the back drop of the old town.
We were here only for a night to ‘verify’ if Alfred Hitchcock recommended sunsets were truly more beautiful than Rovinj. We were almost proven wrong. Rovinj, still maintains the crown for the best sunsets – in all my life.
Zadar sunset was long and intense, but it was distracted by a man-made disaster. Celebrity cruise positioned them between us and the sun like a moon.
This is the city where the Sea Organ—an architectural sound installation—transforms waves into music. Scores of people walked towards the sea organ and the light show later after the sun set. If you got kids, this the place you want to be. They enjoy it a lot and a great spot for insta. It wasn’t something for me. Where I see thousands of people congregating, I run away.
The Adriatic here has a different character than in Rovinj. It's wider, more exposed, with light that stretches horizontally across the water in golden paths.
On the day of our arrival our host allowed us to check in at 11 AM which was amazing, and then we set out for our 24 hour exploration. This was a soujourn before we were heading to the next main attraction Trogir the next day and I wasn’t expecting much but a relaxing day.
As soon as we set out for a walk, I found my spot. It was the location of the ancient Roman ruins and it was perfect enough sunny day and a great spot for me among the ruins and draw.
Zadar didn’t leave any specific impression on me good or bad. It’s an easy going town. I am not sure if I would want to go back if I have time crunch- like Grand Rapid MI.
What struck me most was how the modern installations (the Sea Organ and the Sun Salutation) didn't diminish the ancient city but created a dialogue with it. Here was a place that understood you could honor the past while creating something new—a lesson for any artist trying to find their voice among the echoes of history.
Trogir
Trogir is a small town with a size of a jewel box—a tiny island connected by bridges. The medieval architecture creates dramatic plays of light and shadow, especially in the late afternoon when the sun angles through narrow streets.
It must be said here that the people of Croatia are remarkably hospitable. Our host not only received us but walked with us to a nearby parking lot to show us how the parking works. Remember, parking in Croatian old towns is a challenge because these are ancient cities built and lived in before cars were invented. And they've preserved the uniqueness of these places for thousands of years—a small price to pay is figuring out where to leave your vehicle.
Our room had a balcony that opened to a back view of an ancient tower, not far from our building. And Croatians mean business when it comes to ringing those bells. They ring often and they don't stop. At first we were fascinated. Soon it became a scene from My Cousin Vinny, where the couple wakes at five to a passing train. The romance of medieval life, complete with sleep deprivation.
Trogir gives Rovinj a good fight in beauty and amazing structure. It has a great waterfront. It's very tiny—you can walk the entire island in an hour. Restaurants here are amazing but we found many overpriced, so we walked to the edge of the tiny island and found a local place with reasonable rates. Surprisingly, it was the busiest joint in town. They had a lamb chops special for €17.50 that made us understand why locals know best.
We spent a day walking through tiny winding alleys, discovering this jewelry box of a town. I found a great coffee shop with a perfect view of the alley and the fast-changing light—the kind of spot where you could watch an entire day pass through the stones. I was able to quickly sketch while sipping their curated South American coffee that came in a pot, a small luxury that made the moment feel suspended in time.
I painted from a vantage point overlooking the waterfront promenade, where locals and the remaining tourists strolled in that unhurried Mediterranean way. The stone here is honey-colored, different from Rovinj's gray-white marble, and it glows almost from within when the light hits it right.
What I tried to capture was the layering—centuries of human presence stacked like geological strata. You can see Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance, and Baroque elements sometimes within a single building. It's a reminder that nothing we create exists in isolation; we're always in conversation with those who came before us. My pastel strokes layered over each other, corrections and additions building up like those architectural eras, until the image emerged not from a single vision but from accumulated decisions—mistakes transformed into texture.
We spent our second day making a reconnaissance mission to Split. We'd never taken a ferry before and wanted to make sure everything was aligned, so we visited the Split ferry terminal to confirm procedures, parking, timing. The ticket clerk said she wished all tourists were like us. You get the point—we're planners, sometimes to a fault.
We used that day to visit Diocletian's Palace in Split and grabbed a quick beer and Mediterranean salad at the waterfront. That's one thing about food—many times we wanted to eat out but not splurge, for both pocket and health reasons. So we'd grab a drink and salad, which served perfectly for stomach and wallet alike.
Split is spectacular, but after visiting tiny Trogir and intimate Rovinj, it couldn't impress us much. It's a big town, very busy, almost overwhelming after the human-scale beauty of the smaller places. And honestly, we were already looking forward to Hvar the next day, eager to discover what all the fuss was about. We had two nights planned there and were debating whether to squeeze in an overnight trip to either Dubrovnik or Korčula before the brutal 11-hour drive back to Milan.
Hvar
There is something about Hvar. Something in its name, its colors, the smoothness of its air and light. It's hard to capture in a camera. It's soothing to your senses in a way that bypasses language entirely.
First of all, we hit a perfect 10 on our accommodation: an ocean-front, large one-bedroom apartment seven minutes from downtown for only €80 per night. The magic of traveling in the post-shoulder months. We arrived in the last week of the Croatian work year—almost all the restaurants were about to close for winter, giving everything a bittersweet, end-of-season quality.
My eyes were set on a specific beach called Dubovica, which was hard to get to and was the main reason we brought the car via ferry to the island. It cost us €43 for two people and a car to cross from the mainland, then another 30 minutes through winding mountainous roads to reach our coastal apartment. Worth every euro and every hairpin turn.
It was Friday night when we arrived. The party was about to wind down for the season. We walked along the coastal promenade and took pictures. If Rovinj's night walk is magical, Hvar's is more theatrical—a performance in its final act. The coast was lined with really big, beautiful yachts, or so I thought. Perhaps they were there to celebrate the last week before the island closed for winter. The next morning, all the yachts were gone, like a dream that evaporates with daylight.
The next day we drove to my bucket-list beach, Dubovica. There is something about this beach that makes it perfect—like a Paul Cézanne painting come to life. The color, the composition, the tones—everything as it's meant to be. There's one big house so perfectly placed it feels like part of nature rather than an imposition on it. The circular angle of the beach and the outline of mountains from both sides create a composition so balanced it seems designed by a master architect who understood beauty intuitively.
The best part? It's hard to get to. You park your car on the highway, then climb down a strenuous 15-minute walk that's even harder coming back up. But once you're down, it's a magic kingdom. There are two little fishermen's homes that will cook and serve you wine and food. They brew their own wine—the kind that tastes like the island itself, like sunlight and stone and salt air.
Unfortunately for color sketching, it wasn't an ideal day. It was perfectly sunny with full sun directly overhead—the worst light for an artist. When the sun is that bright, you can't catch the nuanced colors; everything gets flattened by the glare. Even my photographs came out a little overexposed. I did what I could, but I came back to the room half-heartedly, knowing I hadn't captured what I'd seen.
The next morning I was determined to make the best of Hvar—to go out with a bang. I knew the angle I wanted. As I walked along the shore, I found that perfect composition. The wind was picking up and the boats were moving, but I think I got the strongest composition of the entire trip.
This was where Van Gogh's mackerel metaphor fully revealed itself to me. The water was simultaneously gray, blue, green, and violet—not mixed together but existing in states that changed as clouds moved and light shifted. I worked with my limited palette, learning again that limitation breeds creativity. When you can't match reality exactly, you must interpret it, and interpretation is where art lives.
Hvar was also where I felt I'd completed something—not just six paintings but a return to myself. For a year I'd been in transit, between cities and countries and versions of my life. These twelve days in Croatia, these six small paintings created with rusty pastels and shaky confidence, were my way of saying: I'm still here. I still see. I still create.
What Croatia gave me—what Hvar specifically gave me—was proof that dormancy is not death. That a year of silence doesn't erase what you are. That the creative impulse, like those bells in Trogir, keeps ringing whether you're ready to hear it or not. And when you finally listen, when you finally pick up those pastels and respond to the light in front of you, something fundamental shifts. You remember that before you were anything else—before the corporate obligations, before the caregiving duties, before the moves between cities—you were someone who looked at beauty and felt compelled to bear witness to it.
That person was still there. That person had just been waiting for the right light.
The light we seek
In the end, what Croatia gave me wasn't just beautiful vistas to paint but permission to begin again. Sometimes we need to travel not to find something new but to remember who we've always been. The pastels that had traveled unopened through so many journeys finally found their purpose. The sketchbook, half-completed and patient, became whole.
Van Gogh never went to Croatia, but his words guided me there. And now, when I look at these six small paintings, I see not just harbors and waterfalls and sunset light, but proof that the creative heart, once locked away, can be reopened. All it takes is the right light, the right moment, and the courage to pick up those rusty pastels and begin.