Just an Artist's Note:


" For hundreds of years it has been known that teaching the arts, along with history and math and biology, helps to create the 'well-rounded mind' that western civilization and America have been grounded upon. We need that 'well-rounded mind' now, for it is from creativity and imagination that the solutions to our political and social problems will come."

-Richard Dreyfuss

          Much of Sarah’s art is self portraiture and is heavily influenced by the German and Austrian expressionists of the early 20th Century who expressed pain through color, stark contrasts, grotesque and exaggerated figures, faces, and forms.

Early September 2007, a strange accident left Sarah with severe chronic physical conditions including Fibromyalgia and memory difficulties. Losing the ability of artistic expression tries to think of her difficulties as a “blessing in disguise” as a “renewed artistic desire” has emerged within. Describing The Fine Arts not only as an “inner passion,” but most of all a “necessity.” Providing a “renewal” of her “spirit, needed even more now because of my other deficits.”

Having lost her ability to participate in many activities she once loved, such as hiking and camping, her most recent works of art mirror the many unresolved realizations and frustrations of her inner struggles and a means of expressing her most inner feelings. “Art is in me and part of me” deems Sarah.

Although she works in different mediums, her favorite is oil paint. She likes the physical texture and quality of the paint and tends to use only four or five vivid colors supplemented with their color combinations.

She describes her work as “vivid,” not only referring to color, but also referring to the depiction of the subject matter. “Color, uncomfortable or shocking subject matter, materials, and application techniques contribute to a vivid or memorable image.”


Sarah continues her recovery efforts after nearly a two year medical leave from formal academic studies. She recently resumed classes at Viterbo Uniersity. Holding true to her belief that “ art has become her visual journal,” and accepts as truth, “art is a snapshot of an artist’s life or an artist’s perception of life.”

Sarah, a La Crosse native, is a senior at Viterbo University and is working to complete degrees in studio art emphasized in Painting and Fine Arts Education.

By:                                                                                                                          Jeff Guin
2009