For a significant part of her early childhood, Sabrina Powell grew up on a boat – a boat her artistic parents built themselves.

It was only when she was nine-years-old that she moved into a more traditional home, and in those early years she learnt a lot about nature and art.

And today Ms Powell is an art teacher at Kaleidoscope Arts Foundation, where her work is on exhibit with pieces by Katherine Harriott, Jenni Kenny, Nikki Lines, Corrina Rego, Fiona Rodriguez Roberts and Michael Walsh.

Her work has previously shown at the Bermuda Society of Arts and she also had a sculpture accepted into Masterworks' Charman Prize 2010, which opens on February 5.

The current show comes down next Monday, although select pieces will go to the Ace Gallery for a show opening in mid-February.

Ms Powell insists her artistic natire all stems from the vessel her parents – boat mechanic Steven Powell and artist Donatella (Donna) Hermina Bacchetti Powell – built from the ground up in St. George's Ship Yard before she was born.

They kept it docked in St. David's Bay.

"We moved onto it two days before my first birthday," said Ms Powell.

"We stayed there until my older sister and I got too big for it. I was nine years old when we moved to Pembroke. We later moved back to St. David's because we missed being by the water."

Growing up on a houseboat was the best childhood a girl could have, she said. "It allowed me to explore and have a deeper appreciation for nature. I remember going outside on the deck and looking at all the animals and their habitats for hours.

"As a child I was always drawing and painting. It was the best way for me to express myself. It was awesome!"

Life was a constant adventure when she was a child, Ms Powell said.

"We had all the amenities of a regular house – we even had pets and [the video game player] Nintendo, which back then was like having a PlayStation.

"After school and on the weekends my sister and I would ride our bikes go swimming and fishing.

"If I wasn't doing those things you could find me creating my precious paintings and drawings. We didn't have a lot of money but my parents made up for it in love.

"I like to believe this is what started my interest in art. My mother is an artist and she constantly encouraged me to create.

"Whenever I saw her work I remember always wanting to be as good as her. As a little girl she always told me how proud of me she was whenever I showed her my newest painting, which was usually an ocean scene that always included a whale, a shark, an octopus and an otter – don't ask.

"I would always look around outside my house for inspiration. At school I was the one laying in the grass staring at the cloud shapes in the sky. Expressing myself through art is my number one passion."

As a child she never doubted she would grow up to have a career involving art in some form, Ms Powell said. "It is my passion. It wasn't until university that I found my calling to be a teacher."

Teaching and producing her own work involves some juggling, she admitted.

"With art you have to be in the right mind frame and it comes and goes as it pleases. I really have little control over it, but when I am able to create a piece, it feels so good and is such a release. It makes you want to do more."

Ms Powell taught at Clearwater Middle School for two years before joining the Kaleidoscope Arts Foundation.

Her favourite mediums are charcoal, ink, metal and acrylic, but, she said: "I am always open to trying something new.

"My Bermuda College professor Edwin Smith always told me, 'when you start limiting yourself that's when you stop growing as an artist'. I live by that.

"So when I heard about the show I was excited and couldn't wait to show some pieces."

She finds inspiration for her work in "nature, colour and life". Her current works were inspired by a dead butterfly she found on the road.

"They are a kind of memory of the butterfly's intricate beauty and how invasive humans can be to our earth sometimes," she said.

"Beauty and art are all around us; we just have to look around."

Gallery Hours: Tuesday to Saturday 10 a.m. - 2 p.m. or by appointment contact: Laura Lyons on either, 542-9000 or elliot@kaf.bm.