Sarah talks about growth and influence

How did you get started?

It’s funny, I’ve always drawn but it was never my main focus as a child. Up until I was 12, I was a bal­let dancer & a pretty good one at that. Every­one thought it was going to be my career. Then when I was diag­nosed with Chronic Fatigue Syn­drome, I had to give it up and I des­per­ately needed another cre­ative out­let. Art just kind of fell into my lap.

What is your artis­tic vision?

You know those moments when it feels like your spirit is danc­ing? When you’re almost painfully full of life and joy and every­thing in between? That. That’s what I want to cap­ture every time I put brush to can­vas. Some­times I get it across, some­times I don’t. But that’s my focus every sin­gle time.

Describe your evo­lu­tion as an artist.

It’s a pretty short one! It took me a while to find my artis­tic voice and fig­ure out what I was try­ing to express. It came to me in drips and drops. I always felt it, but it took me until this past year to really find the words for it. It feels really right to me right now, although I’m sure that it will change as I grow as an artist.

Who and what influ­enced you the most in devel­op­ing your vision and voice?

Velasquez was my first major influ­ence. I’d bor­rowed Sis­ter Wendy’s 1000 Mas­ter­pieces of West­ern Art from the library, and it fea­tured the Water Seller. He painted it at 19. It was a piv­otal moment for me – I knew that if I could even­tu­ally paint even a frac­tion as well as he had, I’d die happy.

Aside from him, Sar­gent, Manet and Frida Kahlo have been influ­ences on me — Kahlo espe­cially. I can really relate to her. She reminds me to paint and live with pas­sion. Her story is tragic, but there’s so much hope there, so much of a life well lived. That’s what I want.

Sarah is an amaz­ing young artist who drips wis­dom and pas­sion, for life and art, so much that she clearly is an old soul. She is rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the energy, self insight and pas­sion we des­per­ately need in the gen­er­a­tion of artists and cre­atives who will replace us.

Sarah makes “art that reminds you to dream, to breathe, to laugh breath­lessly in the rain”, in doing so she hopes help peo­ple learn “to feel again”.

Sarah’s pas­sion and love for what she does has been chal­lenged by the her con­stant com­pan­ion of Chronic Fatigue Syn­drome. As a per­son who knows all to well the chal­lenges of liv­ing with a debil­i­tat­ing chronic dis­ease I was impressed with her courage, open­ness and unwill­ing­ness to sur­ren­der. She has a lot to tell us not only of art but also of life…

You can find Sarah here:

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