Sara Swan : Painter

	Los Angeles artist Sara Swan, began her career as an illustrator, working for many of America`s top magazines, newspapers and book publishers. In recent years she has focused her attention on fine art, creating detailed pastel and mixed media drawings. To view the art, please click on the categories below.



	Recent work Dresses Past work

I am an artist living and working in Los Angeles. I studied fine art at Whitman College, design at UC Davis, and illustration at Art Center College of Design. Chalk pastels are my primary medium, but I also paint, using alkyd oil colors. Saturated and intense color, unusual color combinations and textures inspire most of my work.

I began my career as an illustrator, creating pieces for books and magazines that were humorous and highly stylized. Until recently, the art I produced was very derivative of my illustration style, (see Past work). About three years ago, I became inspired by something very different.

The Dress Series represents a new direction, and a commitment to the human form. The series is based on sketches I do in a weekly drawing class. I brought the sketches into my studio and enlarged them by about 160%. I then redrew the figures on 30" x 40" paper, and drew a dress over each figure. In most cases the dresses are somewhat sheer, revealing the original figure drawing underneath . This was an important step in the process because I wanted to maintain the integrity of the models' original poses from the class.

The drawings satisfied my interest in the human figure as well as my love of fashion, but finding the right color scheme for each drawing was surprisingly difficult. The style of each dress seemed to dictate what color that dress should be. I then chose the background colors. I tried a number of color combinations before finding eight different ones that have the right balance of intensity and contrast.

Sketch 2

The finished pieces, particularly the standing figures, are based on sketches for which the model posed for as little as one minute. My goal was to create something substantial from drawings that were done in a very short amount of time. As the Dress Series would suggest, my work is female-centric. I am currently working on a new series that will further explore the female form.
Please enjoy browsing through the gallery.

Sara Swan

January 2010