I didn't have much technique, but one thing was already clear: the choice of my subjects! I was going to paint a cougar. But I didn't want to create an expected image. I wanted to insert an element of strangeness, trying to put into practice some notions I had studied at the Contemporary Art classes. I would have represented it stretched out on a streetlamp, like those that illuminate some large avenues. Looking at the photo after years, I realize that it takes a bit of imagination to understand that it is actually a street lamp, so I had to specify! I painted this oil on canvas in Venice, in the painting studio where I was enrolled at the Academy of Fine Arts, it was I believe in 2007. I was a bit in awe of hanging the canvas on the wall, under the eyes of my companions who were wondering what I was going to do. But I remember that I was quite satisfied with the result at the end, which after many years I find sweet. But I'm glad that this was my feeling at the time, because it was probably the one that pushed me to continue with such constancy.

Once dry, I then rolled up the painting and took it home, where I lived with other girls, not too far from the institute. I put it aside in a sort of closet, then came the Christmas holidays, during which I went back to my parents' house in Bolzano, until the new year. One of my roommates stayed in the apartment in Venice to celebrate New Year's Eve, having a party at home with several friends. When I returned to Venice two weeks later, I realized that the rolled-up canvas was gone. I looked for it, I was sure it was there, I looked all over the apartment. I asked my roommate, but she didn't know anything about it. She was sure that none of her guests had gone out with the painting, she would have noticed, because it wasn't a small canvas. And so I never found this cougar again. I didn't know whether to be disappointed or even rejoice: at least someone liked it!