Financial consultant gives up career to become artist
A FORMER financial consultant who helped broker multi-million dollar deals in America, has turned his back on the balance sheets to become an artist in Edinburgh.
Gabriel Böhmer, originally from Zurich in Switzerland, began his career as a management consultant in Boston for a global strategy consulting firm Stax, which provides financial advice to big corporations and private equity firms.
After leaving the profession in 2011 and moving to Buenos Aires with his wife, they moved to Edinburgh three years ago.
Since then, the 31-yearold has been making waves with his whimsical, witty and subconscious-inspired paintings.
He has since sold more than 300 artworks to 120 different customers through online art platform, Artfinder, with interest from buyers in the UK, America and Australia.
Gabriel, who has a master’s degree in busi- ness administration (management), said: “I got the chance to come to Scotland three years ago.
“I originally wanted to create a start-up to trade on the stock market where I would devote a percentage of profit to invest in arts projects.”
Instead, he managed a successful Kickstarter campaign for his book, Beetle Days, which he also illustrated.
He says his work is inspired by the “fleeting thoughts we may get when having a cup of tea”.
These may not always be positive, but he tries to put on a positive spin.
Of his change in career, he said: “I went to university for economics and finance, so there’s always a little bit of regret and recognition of not pursuing that, but I feel that I’m now doing something positive people can relate to.
“I’m now in a field where I can be the most creative, and inspire other people’s own creativity through my work.”
He said: “I’m inspired by the subconscious and the idea that we all have a secret narrative that we carry around with us.
“I love the way that customers often reach out to me after receiving my work with witty and personal interpretations.”
One of his works, Chasing Butterflies, captures how he feels about his change of career. It says: “Though he had a thorough understanding of economics, he still preferred chasing butterflies.”