Featured Artist

Holly Savas

Shape Towers

Mixed Media Collage on Birch Panel

Artist Statement:

My mixed media collage work is a visual expression of the contrasts I see in the world. I tend to view life in abstract fragments: bits and pieces of colors and shapes that float, clash and connect to one another across two dimensions in front of me as I move through my environment. On canvas and wood panel, I recreate this vision using contrasting colors, textures and materials, punctuating overarching vertical movement with unexpected horizontal dashes, and pairing areas of abstract visual chaos with clean rows of geometric shapes.

My favorite part of being an artist is finding a way to distill everything I absorb from my environment — the shapes of buildings I see downtown, the light and shadows of trees in Golden Gate Park, or the colors of the beach — into a small, concentrated dose of my experiences. It’s very satisfying to look at a collection of my completed collages and revisit the sensory memories contained in them, all through a filter that exaggerates the best of what I experienced or that perhaps even replaces what I actually saw, with what I wish I had seen. On canvas, I can make the ocean as blue as I want it to be or I can make it nearly white. I can make skyscrapers out of flower patterned wallpaper or from debris I find on the street. Through art, can I convert reality into a slightly more optimistic version of itself, which I find makes most people pretty happy.