Today we’d like to introduce you to Sarah Graham.
Hi Sarah, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I’ve probably been drawing since I could hold a pencil, and my mom is an artist, so she encouraged the interest as I grew up and gave me my first introduction to watercolor. It wasn’t my original intention to get my degree in art, but by the time I took my first painting class as a sophomore in college, I couldn’t really justify another major, so I switched tracks and got my art degree with a painting concentration.
Since then I’ve been painting professionally in one form or another. I did a lot of small commission work when I was just starting out. I participated in local and regional art competitions and gave demonstrations at local art societies and did a little work for galleries. In recent years, my primary focus has been the quality of my work and message.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
It has not been a smooth road at all! 🙂 Like many artists, I am no stranger to the balance between art and business. What makes me good at seeing the world in a certain way and translating it into visual language is also what makes me struggle with the business side of marketing and selling my art. That has always been, and probably always will be a tension for me.
Another major hurdle came when my husband and I started a family. Being a mom is a full-time job with every night on call. It is hard to keep up a career at the same time, and when my children were babies, I cut back in quite a few areas in order to maintain a healthy balance. Stopping altogether was never an option though. Making art makes me a better person, so even though there are small costs to my family for me to do it, it is better for all of us in the end because I have more to give when I am able to make art.
Currently, keeping the family/work balance is still one of my main challenges. Also navigating the many changes in technology and social media that affect artists and how we are able to market and sell our work in different ways has been a sharp learning curve that continues.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
My work focuses on noticing things that are usually overlooked and not valued. With portraits, I am drawn to ordinary angles, nondescript clothing and expressions. With landscapes, I love neglected clumps of trees, and the unassuming charm of my local Texas landscape… I want to recognize what we normally wouldn’t look twice at, and paint it with such great honor that we can’t stop looking.
I think of my work as speaking a wordless language that we all need at times, whether things are very hard or whether they are just everyday mundane, the most important things can be easily overlooked and neglected. It comforts me when life is hard not to despair and give up. It energizes me when life is slow not to be bored and give up.
Learning to see and appreciate in this way has also been a form of gentle resistance to the harsh and unforgiving nature that life sometimes has. There is a place for bold words and big plans, but I feel my place is to speak this visual language as a healing influence and a reprieve when things are hard, not just for myself, but for others who find themselves weary.
I hope it brings quiet resistance to despair in hardship but also a determined appreciation for ordinary people and seasons in life.
I try to say all of these things through the medium of watercolor painted on textured panels. My accompanying photos contain examples of a few of my paintings. They are all reflections on the power of ordinary moments and glamorless strength. The portraits are simply a nondescript moment in time that is worth remembering. The Texas landscapes reflect on scruffy foliage having nothing to prove. When I see trees like these, I see myself and others: learning that ordinary is special, despite the pressure to be viral on social media: learning that strength grows in the in-between spaces.
A formal artist bio, including education and honors, can be found on Sarah’s website: https://sarahgrahamart.com/about/
Before we let you go, we’ve got to ask if you have any advice for those who are just starting out?
Don’t be afraid of a humble road. If you’re the kind of person who breathes beauty and suffocates without it, find a way to be creative in some way during every season of life. If that becomes your full-time career, great. But you are no less if it doesn’t. We need creatives everywhere. It will strengthen you and what you have to offer to your world, no matter what label it has. For me, I will probably never be a classic full-time artist because I have committed to a lifetime career caring for and running a family, but that doesn’t have to stop me from being a serious painter. While maintaining and improving my skills remains an important part of my practice, I have learned that my art work is deeply informed by life experience, and it is much stronger than it would be if I was exclusively making art and not spending time in “ordinary” life. I find my work connects more with other people because my life has more in common with them than it would if I was full time creating. This is important to me because although I need to be fed by my work, I don’t want it to be just for me.
Pricing:
- Most of my current work is sold through galleries or shows. Information about them can be found on my website or following me on Instagram.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://SarahGrahamArt.com
- Instagram: @sarah_graham_art
- Facebook: Sarah Graham Art
