Interview
Sana Shaw
Sana Shaw is an artist-researcher who creates her works conceptually at the intersection of art, fashion, philosophy, politics, futurology, and sociology. She was born in Ukraine, lives and works in Houston, USA. Sana studied printing technologies at the Lviv Printing College, book and magazine graphics at the Moscow Printing University, after which she worked in a publishing center, was engaged in advertising and creating brand books for various companies. She then continued her studies at the Academy of Architecture and Art in Yekaterinburg, Russia, with specialty in Fashion Design. She created her own creative fashion studio and clothing brand "Oksana ART", which was a significant achievement in her career. For 12 years she worked as an illustrator and fashion artist, creating pret-a-porter seasonal collections and presenting them at Fashion Weeks in Russia and abroad. For the next 7 years, Sana traveled to different countries around the world, which transformed her as a person and as an artist.
In 2016, she moved to Houston. Here she changed the focus of her artistic career and began creating paintings and sculptures in mixed media techniques, influenced by the global cultural process of metamodernism. She has taken part in many group exhibitions, local and international competitions, and has received many awards. Her personal exhibitions were held in the studio-gallery Silver Street Studios of the famous US art community SAWYER YARD. Sana's works are in private collections in America, England, Canada, Singapore, Italy, Greece, Belgium, Ukraine, etc. Sana Shaw currently is working in her studio, collaborating with several galleries and preparing for a personal exhibition.
What is your background and how did you start your journey in the art world?
“I was born and raised in a creative family in Western Ukraine. I think that many hobbies come to us from childhood, and later they can develop into a profession. My mother had excellent artistic taste and drew well. I always asked her to make illustrations for the fairy tales she read to me. My grandparents were actors and performed in local musical theater. The love for drawing began in me at a young age. I wanted to capture on paper what I feel and express my thoughts through drawing. I remember that in elementary school I drew art homework for many students, which was unacceptable and the teachers scolded me. Later my life was always connected with art. I am a professional artist and designer. After graduating from the Faculty of Graphic Arts of the Printing University, I developed logos for various companies, which I really enjoyed. I also worked in the advertising business. Then I moved to another city for permanent residence and decided to try myself in a different capacity. I received my master's degree in Fashion Design. I think my passion for fashion came from my family, where everyone in the family was passionate about fashion. It was a great pleasure for me to create my own fashion studio, then my clothing brand Oksana Art. I have participated in many local and international fashion shows which can be seen on my YouTube channel. But my life has developed in such a way that since 2016 I have been living and working in the city of Houston in the USA. Here it was my turn to fulfill my old childhood dream. I changed the focus of my art career. I create mixed media works on canvas, and I plan to continue to develop in this direction.”
What does your work aim to say? Does it comment on any current social or political issues?
“My art is a reflection of the nerve of the era, zeitgeist. It rethinks the complex processes of searching for a new world order through social and military crises. In my works I reflect the changes in the world that have occurred recently. In addition to wars and conflicts, digital technologies, nanotechnologies, and biomedicine have appeared in the world. Changes happen so quickly that people do not have time to adapt to them. In our minds, the old world we are familiar with is collapsing like a pile of rubble. Our old reality is very visibly present in our lives, it evokes strong emotions in us, and at the same time subtly eludes us, dissolving in the coming new reality. It still seems that the world is still the same, the same people, the same cities, but time inexorably takes everything that was back, day after day it crosses out everything old and creates a new reality and new meanings. We live simultaneously in the old and new reality, and at the same time we observe the transition from one reality to another. We are at the intersection of the collapse of the old and the construction of a new world. The interdisciplinary approach of a metamodern artist allows me to observe this transition and explore it comprehensively. That is why my art creates tension and conflict, while simultaneously showing a way out of it through a combination of contrasting phenomena: destruction and creation, clarity and ambiguity, irony and sincerity, relativism and the need to make choices. The fragments of broken decorative elements that I use in my works symbolize our old reality. Their decorativeness and belonging to the culture of the past, on the one hand, and their use in a modern context in my works on the other hand, also contrasting black and white colors create tension in the viewer. And tension, for its part, conveys the feeling that a person experiences when reality quickly changes. Previously, people lived for centuries without much change, so our consciousness still cannot switch to this coming new world at super-fast speed.”
Do you plan your work in advance, or is it improvisation?
“Previously, I allowed my imagination to improvise endlessly. But I soon realized that this did not contribute to the formation of a series of works. So now I am planning the main points of my work, especially the composition and the ratio of large, small and medium masses on the canvas. I think through the idea of the series, color, working methods and give the task to my subconscious to work clearly within the framework of this series. But improvisation is still present in my works, some details are added in the process, something changes slightly. It happens much less often that the original idea undergoes significant changes during the work process.”
Are there any art world trends you are following?
“Following trends in the world and art and rethinking them is the main part of the theoretical preparation for creating my art. From the perspective of a metamodernist artist, I explore events and trends in politics, sociology, futurology, fashion, design and art, in order to then apply the results of these studies to my work. I always follow famous exhibitions, biennales, fairs, publications in contemporary art magazines and the work of famous artists who set trends. This allows me to keep abreast of events in the world and art.”
What process, materials and techniques do you use to create your artwork?
“My visual language is expressed primarily in a black and white palette with small additions of other colors, and non-artistic industrial materials embedded in the space of the canvas. I use plaster, stacco, cement, clay, etc. Broken elements of the ancient style, baroque, gothic are conceptually connected with the destruction of the current world order and visually refer us to eternity - archeology, making comments on it in their works. Mixed media practice and my experimental technique bring tensions from the real world into art, where bridging the distance between them allows us to recreate a sense of wholeness. This is how I transform postmodern deconstructivism into harmonious constructivism, offering the viewer a new vision of the world with positive scenarios.”
“My visual language is expressed primarily in a black and white palette with small additions of other colors, and non-artistic industrial materials embedded in the space of the canvas.”
What does your art mean to you?
“I started my artistic journey in fashion, then in the decorative arts, but I soon realized that I wanted to say more than just showcase the aesthetic appeal of my work. What worried me most was the changes in the world that are now happening at great speed. Art for me means expressing my position, showing changes in the world through interdisciplinary research and giving people hope for a better future. I can say that art is my life. I have always been involved in art and I don’t know any other way to express myself, transform the world and experience life.”
What’s your favorite artwork and why?
“Over the course of my creative life, I have collected several favorite works that I keep for myself. There is something personal associated with each of them. For example, I created one of these works in an incomprehensible state, when someone seemed to be guiding my hand. But still, my favorite job is the one I’m working on now. I can put my latest ideas into it.”
Have you had any noteworthy exhibitions you'd like to share?
“Throughout my artistic career I have participated in many local, national and international exhibitions and competitions. Information about them is available in my portfolio and on my website. I especially remember the show in Texas, Livingston, where I won Best in Show. The international invitational show at the Madeley Gallery in Conroe, Texas was exciting. Also special were my solo art exhibitions in the famous American art community Sawyer Yard, where my studio was located at that time. Currently, my art is being shown at Art Basel Week 2023 in Miami.”
