In my 11th interview in this series I interview artist and teacher Fatih Mıstaçoğlu, better known as ‘Fab’. I collaborated with Fab for the first time last year for Mindfultober and was entirely charmed by the energy and humour he brings to his work. In this fun conversation, we talk about curiosity-driven art, creative problem solving, and why he’s called ‘Fab’ .

Shelley Skail: I have set of questions that I normally ask, but I’m going to break the mould a little bit because I have one that I’ve wanted to ask you for ages: why do you have the nickname “Fab”?

Fatih ‘Fab’ Mıstaçoğlu: Yeah, that’s kind of a story. People think it’s short for ‘fabulous’; that’s what they go for. And in the reviews for my classes, they make lots of word-play playing with ‘fabulous’. I even joke in one of my classes that ‘Fab’ is not short for ‘fabulous’.

I am fabulous, but it’s just not the real source of it. 

There is a book series called Rift Wars Saga. It’s like – imagine Lord of the Rings with more magic. I love it. There are, like, 30 books. I’ve read almost all of them. And when I was still in University, I really loved these books.

But there was one part of it that the author didn’t quite get into. There were these amazing creatures who lived long time ago; the Dragon Riders. And so I decided to write that part myself. So as I was writing this, I started from a mythology of it, how everything started with two gods. One of them was Order, the other one was Chaos. 

And the Turkish word for Order, the first three letters of it, F-A-B, just became Fab. So these ancient Gods became Fab and Kho, Order and Chaos. 

And of course, I don’t know, maybe because I’m not organised at all in my life and in my brain, I picked that one as a mantle for myself, and I became ‘Fab’. 

I love that! I was about to say, ‘order’ doesn’t sound like how I’ve seen you talk about how your brain works. 

[Laughs] No, not at all.

So this is an aspirational thing?

Maybe. Maybe that’s why I picked it. This wouldn’t be the studio of the Order God. It’s like I’m in a total mess. This is definitely run by Chaos at the moment.

That is so interesting. So you also write, then?

I used to write more. That was what I wanted to pursue when I started. I always looked for a creative outlet, let’s say from University times onwards (I’m talking about the Year 2000, that’s when I started University). 

I was in love with some of the satirical comic books that used to come out weekly in Turkey. They would be very bold with their language, criticising the government and so on. And I’m talking about Turkey, a long time ago… And, so I always imagined myself writing a column in there. I even kept blogs at some point. And because of that I went into advertising.

I wanted to be a copywriter because you could do writing but also make a bit of money. And so that’s how I got into it. At first it was that. Then, when I was living in England, it switched to photography. That’s how I got all the photography skills that I’m using today. And that was my outlet. 

Towards the end of my time in England, drawing came into it. Then it was acrylic. It was digital for a while. And then, finally, when I found watercolour about ten years ago, I settled. I still see new things and think I want to try that. But at the moment, watercolour, and just hands-on drawing with paper, that’s my outlet. 

Nice. So you are a ‘multifaceted creative’?

Yeah, I guess that’s me. I mean, if there is something to be done I’ll do it – and it’s not just in an artistic way that my mind works. It’s very solution-oriented. If there is something like, can we just make a shelf here? or whatever, I just try to put things together and make a solution. I feel like art is also the same way for me. 

I can also work with wood. I also built my own stairs that come up here [to my attic studio], for example. 

The desk behind me, I built it as well. It’s a foldable desk. When we started living here in Warsaw, we were just living in a room, so we didn’t have much space. The legs can actually fold underneath, and we were able to put it next to the wardrobe. Then later when I had my studio, it became my desk.

That’s so cool.

I do like doing things hands-on 

Practical problem solving? 

Yes! That’s what I excel at, I think. I am a very solution-oriented person. That can cause problems in marriage, because sometimes it’s like, I just wanted you to listen, not find solutions to my problems, but that’s how my brain works.

I think also that’s a human thing, right? If someone presents you with a problem and you care about them, you want to help them find a solution.

That’s definitely how I feel. Like, if you’re telling me a problem, I will find a solution. Or at least I will try. That’s where my brain goes directly. Otherwise, why are we talking about it?

[Laughs] Well, thank you for indulging me, because I have wondered for a long time! 

The first question I usually like to ask is, where do you get your ideas from for the creative work that you make? 

I don’t believe in creating in a vacuum. I guess I could do that if I had to, but we live in a world that is so well connected at this point, and I’m on the internet, on Instagram a lot or I scroll through Pinterest. So I feel like lots of things accumulate, no matter what, just by existing. It’s like a pinball machine: you just keep bumping into things and accumulating them. 

And when you are a person like me who is always looking for a creative outlet, some of the things that come out, usually you can’t even recognise where they came from because they kind of all merge by the time they come out. But I feel like the source of it, the main thing, is I just sit down, not really with the idea I have to make this more like I have to create something. There is that feeling.

And then once I sit down to do it, then the question becomes, but what? For a long time, it was just everyday life, keeping sketch journals and so on. So my own photos or memories. Having a child helps a lot with that because it’s so novel and fresh. And that’s memories you want to keep. 

So I was drawing my own life a lot, but then I realised I needed something else. And then I switched to abstract work. I have been doing this abstract watercolour escape series – I published the sixth class in this series last October [2025], and the new one is coming out in a few weeks, probably. 

And in that I realised, oh, I love doing this because this didn’t exist before, and now it does! It gives me so much joy. And actually, every single project inspires the next one because of the joy I get from the previous one. I want to feel that rush again: oh, this turned out so good! 

Sometimes it doesn’t turn out so good. That’s also another kind of motivator to make it better next time. But yeah, first I need to create something. Sometimes I see something and say, oh, I should try this. Some techniques look interesting. I like trying different techniques from other artists. But mostly trial and error, lots of experimentation. 

My mind works a lot in ‘what if?’ What if I did this? What if I did that? What if I used a rectangle instead of a circle? What if I painted this pink? This kind of thing.

It sounds like your own curiosity drives a lot of your art. 

Yes. That’s true. It is because I keep thinking what if?  If I had time and energy, all the paintings I do! I would try them in every possible colour combination and see how they turn out. I’m curious how they would look with different compositions, but the same colours – these kind of things. I’m always curious about these things.

Do you have a favourite artist or perhaps a favourite 2 or 3?

At the moment the first name came to my mind that I will say is Ohn Mar Win. I love Ohn Mar’s style. And the moment I see anything when I’m scrolling, I know it’s her without even looking at the name. And that is very special. 

And recently we started talking. 

For a very long time she was an artist I had no access to. I was admiring from afar. And now she’s become sort of a friend and still I think she is amazing and I love her art. 

Other than that, on Instagram, there is Polina Bright. She does amazing portraits with watercolours. And, I’m a bit obsessed with her and her style. Anytime I see her work, I just go to her Instagram profile and check out a few more pieces. 

The portraits are almost always women. She paints very close-up portraits, and she uses the colours very boldly, like she just goes ahead and paints the whole thing purple and then starts bringing the highlights and shadows. I really enjoy watching her process. And she adds gold details later on. 

Do you have a piece of your own art that is your current favourite? 

Yeah, there is. When I started doing this, maybe two years ago, almost three years ago, I got into abstract art and, I was experimenting with patterns a little bit on the side and with watercolour separately. And one night I sat down to draw.

Everyone was asleep, and I was working with a big format. The idea wasn’t even there, I just made a big yellow circle in the middle of a page. Just to see how the wash would turn out, and that was it. The paper was already ready. And I took it and just started drawing circles, patterns and everything.

And now it’s on the wall downstairs, in the sitting room. And every time I’m sitting on the sofa, I can’t stop myself from looking at it. I can’t imagine I did that. And that’s kind of what really made me go into teaching this abstract watercolour escape series, because I thought: I have to share this with people. 

This is because it also made me feel so good. It was very relaxing experience to make this art piece. Using the lines and patterns. And from there I did all six classes. And yet, when I sit down and look at that painting that started it all, I still haen’t been able to recreate this. This is still the top. I’m still trying to beat my own first painting, trying again and again and again.

Do you have a current projects you’re working on or a labor of love?

Yes. It’s something I’ve been doing by myself for a few years now. And this is the both the artwork and the new class I’m working on. 

This is going to be in the new class. I call it Grounding Art. Every year, I take one little word to guide me through the year instead of New Year resolutions. I think I’ve been doing this for a decade. And so, when I pick my word for the year, I start doing little artworks with it. That is a kind of a way of officiating it, like I’m putting it into service. 

And while doing it, this is a way of visualising for me – I’m kind of inventing stories and adding meaning into the painting as I paint it.

For example, I use lots of dots to give this feeling of depth. And I’m imagining, okay, this is intentional, and it’s kind of leading me to my goal. And every single dot I have here is like the things I have to do on my To-Do list. There is a lot of them, and I will do them. 

And so I picked colder colours for the part where the dots are to show that this is the hard part: I have to do all these things intentionally, rather than scrolling my phone and wasting time, and then it will lead me to my goal. Around my goal it’s warm and yellow. So everything here has a bit of meaning.

In the lettering, you can see that the pattern is getting more and more intense towards the end where the goal is. 

So this is what I’m working on at the moment with both my class and my art.

There’s a lot of layered meaning in there. It’s really interesting to hear you explain that.

I know it’s actually lots of bullshit, but meaningful bullshit because it’s basically whatever you make out of it. That’s what I’m putting into this and imagining the things I have to do. And, so, every single brushstroke or dot I am adding with my pen are like the steps I’m going to take towards my goals and I’m going to be more intentional about all of that.

I think most of the meaning of life is what we ascribe to it…

Yeah. All of it is, you know, meaningful and bullshit at the same time.

Yeah, exactly. So if this is meaningful to you, it’s almost like casting a spell. It’s meaningful because you make it meaningful.

Yeah. I hope I will be able to do it. So this is kind of the first step for me. And yeah, my word for 2026 is Intentional.

Nice. I also ascribe words – it’s a little more of a recent habit for me. 

You have? 

Yes, Focused. 

Good one! 

Because, I’m sure you understand this, there’s so many things I could be doing. 

Yeah, totally!

And if I try to do them all, I do nothing. So I need to focus and do the thing and just do it until it’s done.

So, in a sense that has a similar meaning to mine. I’m also trying to be that, basically. Just don’t do things mindlessly. It’s just this energy I have; I need to focus it in some way.

I think it’s like a Creative’s curse.

It is because the brain wanders, mine definitely does. I notice this more and more! Like, I’m just turning to the side to do something and because something else is there, I get distracted immediately. And then I’m like, ‘Why am I doing this thing?’ I forget what the initial thought was so often. So some focus would be helpful

Speaking of… tell me a little bit about this class that’s coming out.

Yes! This was going to be a YouTube video, actually. That’s how I imagined it. That’s the reason I started recording my painting in the first place. Otherwise, I usually do it [making art] by myself without recording. But I said, ‘okay, let’s just make a little video’. So I was recording it, and then at some point it dawned on me that this could actually be a good class. 

I’m doing market research at the moment with my subscribers to find out what they want, and I remember one person saying it would be good for me to show them where they could use their art, like making a greeting card with the watercolour technique; something more useful.

And then, in this artwork, three of the things I already teach are brought together. And that’s when I thought that this might be a very good connection to all those three classes I already have. In this piece, there is abstract art, but also picking this one word which is connected to my productivity; that’s actually the main starting point of my J.U.M.P classes (Just Use Minutes Productively). And I thought I could connect to that. And also there is lettering as well. And I have a lettering class: Everyone Can Draw Letters. 

This actually brings three classes together very well. I thought I could keep this short, saying that if you want more on this topic, you can go to this other class, and maybe you already took these classes. Choose a word for yourself and focus yourself better for the upcoming year.

And so that’s how it became a class.

And it’s coming soon?

Yeah, I’m even hoping before January is out, maybe the last week of January.

It will be a pretty quick production because I already recorded it. I want to make the intro video not like my usual setup. I’m going to make it like someone just took the camera and recorded it. Because, I don’t know if you know my assistant Jack?

Yes.

I wrote a script in my mind. Jack will just turn on the camera. And I will be like, “what are you doing?” And we will discuss that this could actually be a good class, not just a YouTube video. And then from there, I will introduce the class.

I love that!  I do feel a bit sorry for Jack, Fab, because I think maybe you mistreat him a little bit.

Some people said that I bully him, actually. But when anything is mentioned that’s negative about Jack, that’s actually me I’m talking about. I’m blaming myself for everything negative. That’s why I’m so mean to Jack – I’m actually so mean to myself all the time.

I just put that part out of me. This wasn’t planned either – but during one class, it just happened. And so everything where I’m mean to Jack; I’m just mean to myself. I don’t know if people get this, but it’s me, telling myself off, all the time.

For example, in one class, I started recording a class, but it was taking longer back then. And in-between filming I went to the hairdresser. So in one lesson my hair is quite big and messy. And in the next one I have short hair. I was telling Jack off ‘how could you book my hairdresser in the middle of recording?’ These kinds of idiot things, it’s always me and I’m just telling myself off.

I did know that it was that way around, but I don’t know if everyone does.

Yeah. Someone even mentioned that I’m bullying Jack and that if he was a real person, I would be sued. 

Yes. Human resources would be having a word with you.

Most of the things we talk about is why my coffee is cold. And I tell Jack off, and that’s also me because I bring my coffee and I forget to drink it, and usually I end up drinking my coffee cold. And again, I’m just telling myself off.

I love that you’ve externalised that bit of you.

Just put all the negative bits out into an assistant.

Can you tell me about a typical day in your life?

Definitely. Let’s talk about the weekday. I have a son. He’s almost eight, and he started going to school this year. And so today, for example, I woke up at half past six to wake him up, make him breakfast, and prepare him for school. We drop him at school at eight.

The school is very close, just walking distance, and then I come back home. My individual life starts after that, that’s my work time. Well, actually, after taking care of the chores and cleaning the kitchen and so on, and usually there’s exercise in there as well. But around 10:00, if I’m lucky, I start work. That’s my goal to do that.

And so, until 3 p.m., I have time to do my work (with some coffee breaks and so on in between). Then it’s time to collect my son from school, and then we spend time together. We play. Sometimes there’s a play date. 

At the moment, I’m in Warsaw, it’s very cold and gray and we have lots of snow as well. So we are indoors most of the time. But in summer, I collect him from school, then we go and play football or hang out in the park with friends and so on. Then put my son to sleep around 9 p.m., if we are lucky, and then have a bit of time for me and my wife to watch TV shows and eat something and then go to sleep.

That’s a typical day.

Thank you for sharing that. I’m always curious about other people’s routines. 

Is mine similar to yours? 

Yes. I think when you have a child and that child is in school, it kind of puts a structure in your life that you wouldn’t maybe otherwise have. But I think sometimes that structure can be helpful because when you know you have this many hours, that’s the hours that you work with.

Yeah! Then, if you don’t, sorry mate, there’s another day tomorrow, you can start again.

And I’m not a morning person. My focus gets really going actually, after 2 / 3 p.m.

Oh that’s tricky.

Yeah. For example, if I have a free afternoon, I can just work nonstop until midnight. I’ve done that.

But in the morning I’m like, I don’t know, What am I doing? Where are we? What was this? It takes so much time to focus in the mornings, but this is how it is.

That’s one of the things about being an adult, isn’t it?  What’s that expression about having the courage to change the things you can accept and the strength to accept the things you can’t change?

I guess that makes sense. I don’t know that saying, but, yeah, at some point you have to accept this is how it’s going to work. Just because I can focus better at night, I can’t just change the structure of everyone else’s day, and people are dependent on me. So this is how it’s supposed to be.

It feels a lot like swimming against the current in the morning hours. But I think I’m getting better. That’s maybe the whole reason I came up with my own productivity system basically; to find something that works for me from everything I’ve read and seen. I just kind of brought it all together to make something for myself.

I think that was maybe one of the first classes of yours I ever watched. It’s J.U.M.P., right?

Yes.

It’s so funny. I was like, who is this guy, he’s hilarious.

Thank you.

Can you finish this sentence. If you really knew me, you would know…

Hmm, many things could go into this… 

If you really knew me, you would know that I love football and that I love playing football. I play twice a week, and I train and try to be fit just so that I can go and play. 

If you really knew me, you would know that I’m able to paint much less than I would like to. That’s just because running the business and doing the other things around it takes much more time than the painting itself. 

In an ideal world, I would like to not worry about anything. Don’t turn on the camera and just go and do the painting. But in the world we live in, it doesn’t work like that. I need to show it on Instagram and make a recording, and so I can make a class with it and then sit down and edit.  If you really knew me, you would know that I’m painting much less than I would like to.

If you really knew me, you would, maybe, come to my office and see what a mess there is here. And, also, you would know that I have a plan to clean this out. And that was supposed to happen before Christmas and didn’t happen, but that’s also typical of me.

Do you have a joke that you’d like to share? 

I really like Dad jokes. That doesn’t mean that I can remember them. But today I’ve seen one. It was with Hugh Jackman. I think they were doing an interview for a new movie or something. And so that one was, what do you call a fish without eyes.

I don’t know.

.

.

.

Fsh [Laughs]

[Laughs]

I love these kind of stupid things. And in the same video, there was a knock-knock joke:

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Jackman.

Jackman, who?

No, Hugh Jackman.

[Both Laugh] Oh that’s good. 

The Hugh Jackman in the video said that he had never heard this joke before, but he’s keeping it.

I’m a big fan of comedy, stand-up comedians specifically, and I love going to stand-ups. A close friend of mine from Turkey is a stand-up comedian, and he’s coming here next month. I’m very excited for his show. I will get to see his show, we will hang out, and then maybe I will be a groupie – I will go to Prague with him, hang out and he’ll do the show there. 

And my secret, if you knew me, you would know that I secretly want to be a stand-up comedian. This is a fantasy of mine. I want to do it one day. I want to go to an open mic.

I’m terrified of it. I admire anyone who can go on the stage and just talk in front of people with the hope that they will laugh. So I’m still terrified of the idea, but I’ve written some jokes and some sets, but they’re still top secret.

You know, I was just about to ask, do you have any plans to be a comedian? 

I would love to. To me, it sounds so perfect. To be able to go and make people laugh. 

Every time people write in the reviews for my classes that it was funny, I’m very happy about that. Like, putting the creativity aside, I’m most happy when people say, ‘it was a very funny class’ and ‘I really enjoyed it, I laughed out loud’. 

So this is something I want to do. I think I’m still young, I still have a chance. And, also, as you get older, you start caring less about what people think. Maybe there will be a perfect moment, there will be a switch happening and I’m just going to go on the stage. I think it will happen.

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I interviewed Fab on Jan 14th, and his new class is now out: Grounding Abstract Art: Visualize the Year Ahead with Watercolors and Lettering !

You can see more of Fab’s work on Instagram and his YouTube Channel is also well worth a visit.

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If you enjoyed this interview with Fab, you might enjoy my other artist interviews.