Sunday, May 17, 2009

Meet the Artist - With Leaflette

This week, I was browsing some of my favorites' favorites (an excellent sport) when I came upon a wonderful new shop I've never been to before. I had to ask the seller if she wants to be featured on my blog, which she was. What can I say but Yay! and please welcome the lovely and talented Hanna Sandvig!

Tell my readers a bit about yourself.
Hi, I'm Hanna Sandvig! I live in the mountains of BC, Canada with my husband. I'm 27, a Christian, and I love the outdoors. I'm also passionate about cooking and have started gardening this year!

When and how did you begin to draw? Is this your only creative medium?

I have been drawing since I could hold a crayon. I have boxes at home full of my childhood sketchbooks. I started doing digital art seriously about five years ago. It's not my only creative medium, I love sewing, photography, and graphic/webpage design. I also frequently get the urge to do just random crafts, I'm currently making a big mobile of hundreds of paper circles. I wanted to learn to knit this year...but decided that my need to do everything was getting out of hand.



Where do you sell your art? Is this your day job?

I mostly sell my art on Etsy. I have some prints for sale on Deviantart but haven't had much success there. I did pretty well at the local Winter Artisans Market this year and I have some greeting cards in local shops. Unfortunately galleries are still very opposed to carrying digital paintings as they can't sell an “original painting”. It's not my day job, I'm a full time lifeguard/swimming instructor. I enjoy it but I hope to quit and go full time with my creative work when we start having kids.

My favorite water themed drawing on Hanna's shop

Most of the work (and that I love most myself) presented on your shop has an oriental vibe. Was this always your style or is it a phase you are going through right now?
I've always loved oriental cultures. I grew up on Hello Kitty and then Sailor Moon and as much as I try and fight it, I still love anime and Chinese art house movies. Things like cute little action figures and kokeshi dolls follow me home. I would say that Asian culture is probably a third of my influence, the others being vintage kids book illustrations and fairy tales.

Can you tell is a bit about your work process? Your inspiration, the creation process.
I usually have more ideas than time to draw them! I'm inspired a lot by the blogs of other artists and I spend a lot of time going through art on Deviantart.
I do most of my art on the computer, including my sketches. I've included a little flash movie that shows my drawing process.


What is your favorite item of all times?
Hmm, that's a hard one, usually my favorite is whatever I most recently finished! One of my favorites has got to be Red Lanterns though. Even though it's an old on I still love the colors and the romantic mood.

This is my personal favorite at Hanna's shop as well

Where else can you find Hanna:

2 comments:

Valerie's Essentials said...

Hello Hanna... great wright up!! loved reading it. Off to check out her shop! Great things!

Sharona R - שרונה ראובני said...

I love her shop, I bet she will be huge (I mean a huge seller, hopefully she will keep her girlish figure :o).