We were lucky to catch up with Sarah Robinson recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Sarah, thanks for joining us today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

I am a business owner, doing layout and design work and publishing, as well as being a visual artist. A lot of what I learned was by doing, trial and error, especially for design & layout work. I started by working for a publisher in 2001. I had studied graphic arts, just as computers were just beginning to make their way into the workplace in the mid-80s, and so I learned to do everything by hand. Working with the publisher Shoreline, I tried several layout programs as we worked on books. Publisher was an early one that worked fairly well. We tried Quark briefly. InDesign was the best suited, and I still use it. But learning on the job was not ideal. I read what books I could, there were no publishing programs that I knew of at the time, and I was working from home with 2 young daughters. Asking the printer questions was the most direct way to do things properly. A course in InDesign would have been very useful. On the arts side, I have painted since high school. The graphic arts course was a good step forward in learning about art supplies and tools, and gave me some confidence. I ended up starting university at age 47, studying print media. (Etching, screen printing, lithography, digital printing) I did all the studio classes I could over 5 years, and created more seriously since 2018. I also work a day or two a week at an art supply/framing store, which helps with creative drive. We are all artists.

Sarah, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I got into publishing through working for Shoreline since 2001. It started as strictly cover design, but soon grew to encompass interior book design as well. After Covid had settled in for a few months in 2020, I decided to start my own company, Corner Studio, that would be a balance of publishing, offering layout and design of books, and visual arts; painting & printmaking. It seemed a good time to gather my skills into one venture, especially since retail had shut down in our case until the end of June 2020. I didn’t return to the store until about 2022, just a handful of hours a week.

Since 2020 I have published memoirs, historical non-fiction, a historical walking tour, family history, books for young readers, and blank sketchbooks with local artists’ work on the covers. I appreciate the idea of small print runs, where 25 or 30 or 100 copies can be ordered … and then re-ordered as needed. It makes publishing a less environmental issue, with less ink and paper, less production, less storage.

On the visual arts side, I have had a busy year, with half a dozen group exhibitions on the West Island and downtown /Old Montreal. I am in two art groups, who are supportive and give a good sense of community. I also just finished a pop-up event with a dozen artists, in a botanical theme. That is something that is interesting as an artist, having a central theme to share with other creatives.

Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?

I thrive on the creative threads that run through my various work. I do find, however, that the tasks of bookkeeping, preparing for doing taxes, maintaining a website, these are not easily maintained as part of a management system, although they really should be embedded in a weekly pattern. I do have help and am given some sanity from a service called Artwork Archive. It does allow me to catalogue artwork, do bookkeeping, reports, and generally use it to oversee work when it comes time to start doing income tax.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

I think the most rewarding thing is connecting with others. That can be other creatives with common interests and skills, or non-creatives who want to understand what and why I create as I do. I grew up living at a cottage all summer, with no roads, electricity or phones. The serenity and peacefulness found on the lake or in the woods, the surroundings so different from town or city life, I thoroughly appreciated. We are still on that lake, and for 16 years we have kayaked one hour from our car to our little cabin. Still no road or electricity. I love to paint what surrounds us, or create an edition of etchings. These are places we need to protect. Occasionally I am lucky to come in contact with a writer who is as passionate about the natural spaces and how to maintain their green integrity as I am. Sometimes I am able to work with them, along with a kaleidoscope of other interesting and creative authors and illustrators. Each book is a new and different venture, just as each artwork is another world to capture. All the while, I try to keep things as green and energy efficient as possible. We are surrounded by beauty as much as we are confronted by global warming. I am rooting for beauty. Aren’t we all?

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.cornerstudio.org
• Instagram: @cornerstudio.27
• Youtube: Polaroid6

Image Credits

Sarah Robinson