We recently connected with Samantha Hahn and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Samantha, thanks for joining us today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.
In addition to the commercial work I love, I felt compelled to explore my own interests and ideas. Most recently, I started Art Basil: Memories and Meals, Illustrated
A palette- and palate-expanding exploration of recipes and the people behind them
In each edition, a notable person in media, food, or the arts shares a favorite recipe (illustrated by me), its significance, and related treasured memories. I have featured a variety of amazing people from makeup mogul Bobbi Brown to award winning cookbook author Kat Liu.
I started Art Basil to explore my interest in the significant events and memories that food sparks. What we cherish about a recipe goes beyond its taste—it’s about the experiences it evokes and the people who share it with us.
Through illustration, I aim to distill the memories and meaning food holds, removing it from its original context and reimagining it as something lasting. Each post is a labor of love, more akin to a special meal than something served daily or even weekly. I hope that every piece resonates deeply, like a dish imbibed with care and intention.
With Art Basil, I celebrate these connections, using art to explore how food shapes our stories, relationships, and sense of self.
I started my all rainbow art shop, Maison Rainbow, during the COVID-19 quarantine, inspired by my daughter’s love of rainbows. In a time of grey skies, we needed color more than ever. I believe colors have power. Rainbows are the purest manifestation of color in nature. I painted rainbows for the shop named after places. Looking at colors transports you and elevates your mood. My rainbows are not the classic ROYGBIV. I wanted people to find the colors that speak to them so they can get the feeling they want each time they look at the art on their wall.
Samantha, 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’ve never wanted to be anything but an artist. It was natural that I’d go on to study it. Print magazines were my initial main source of work. I learned quickly that the industry is a moving train and that if you want to keep up, you have to run alongside it, even if it changes tracks. I’m always learning and developing as an artist. I love commercial illustration. It provides me an opportunity to work with a range of people and companies in a variety of ways. I tailor my approach to the variety of areas in which I work. Even with different approaches to projects, the work is still me. I’m still at work. One of the things I love about illustration is that it’s ephemeral. It lives briefly, like a conversation. Creatively, it’s about the process. Don’t get me wrong, the product has to exceed the client’s needs, but it serves a delineated purpose, and then I move to the next creative challenge. In love, I’m monogamous. In art, I’ll never settle down.
I enjoy the artistic pivot. I’m just as happy painting fashion, capturing the essence of a look, the movement, and the emotion behind it as I am lettering a book cover that conveys what you will find when you crack the spine. I enjoy the experience of live painting at events. Looking into people’s eyes and communicating what I see of them onto the paper is a beautiful but silent intimacy that’s deep but fleeting. Handlettering a magazine cover always feels like putting a peacock feather in my hat. I especially enjoy an ongoing project, where a client tasks me to create work for a series or column. A few of my favorite examples of that are a series I did with The New York Times Style Section where they had top fashion designers share a DIY project. I started a column with New York Magazine called “Carrying On” about what people were doing during COVID-19 to stay sane and engaged. A recent project that felt significant was painting buildings that were lost during the LA fires for Architectural Digest.
Bio:
Samantha Hahn is an illustrator, art director, and author. Her work has been internationally exhibited from New York to Hong Kong and recognized by It’s Nice That, The New York Times, American Illustration, and the Society of Illustrators & Communication Arts.
SELECT CLIENTS:
The New York Times, Hermes of Paris, The CFDA, Chloe, Kule, Brandon Maxwell, Marc Jacobs, J.Crew, Vogue (Jp, US, Mex), Teen Vogue, Glamour, Elle, Allure, Marie Claire, Surface, Conde Nast Traveler, The Telegraph (UK), Real Simple, Oprah, House Beautiful, New York Magazine/TheCut, Goop, Baron & Baron, Mac Cosmetics, The Ellen MacArthur Foundation, Tiffany’s, Karla Otto, Bold PR, Purple PR, Penguin/Random House, Assouline, St. Martin’s Press, Abrams, Harper Collins, and Chronicle Books.
BOOKS:
Authored books include: A Mother is a Story: A Celebration of Motherhood and accompanying keepsake, Stories for my Child: A Mother’s Memory Journal, Well-Read Women: Portraits of Fiction’s Most Beloved Heroines and reader’s journal Well-Read Women’s Reader’s Journal. Select illustrated books and covers include: Pure Skin, The Wine Questionaire, The Bright Hour, and Rainbow Milk.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
Creating art is a compulsion, a healthy one. I recently saw a designer on Instagram post a photo he took of a child’s drawing posted to a tree. Scrawled on the bottom of their art was a prompt for people to rate their work from 1 to 10. In a sense, all artists want to share their work with others. We may have different internal drives and goals for our work, but fundamentally, we want to put it in front of others’ eyes. We’d create whether or not anyone was looking, but putting it out ‘on the tree’ is compelling.
The process is the most rewarding for me. The fact that a client sought my voice/hand to solve their problem or speak their message moves me and allows me to tap into that primal intuition I have. When I am engaged in my work, hours melt into minutes, and I go into a flow state. There can be struggles and false starts, but I’m not scared of those challenges. I seek for the work to feel easy and gentle. Sometimes, it takes 100 tries, sometimes, it happens the first time the brush touches the paper. Either way, it’s a sacred practice that feels deeply rewarding.
Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?
My goal is to continue the journey without looking for a finish line. Early in my career, I’d fantasize about having certain clients and that elusive feeling of ‘making it.’ I’ve had many of those clients. There’s never a moment where I will feel I have arrived, which is a gift. Working has taught me that work begets work. Ultimately, my goal is to work, share the work, have others see the work, then seek my work, work with them, have others see that work…ad infinitum until I die. The nature of my work will change. When I’m 70, I hope I can be in the flow of life and allow my creativity to seek out the right place for itself. For today though, I just want to keep finding that tree to tack my work to.
Contact Info:
- Website: samanthahahn.com, samanthahahncreative.com, artbasil.food, maisonrainbow.com
- Instagram: @samanthajhahn
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/samanthahahnillustrator/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samanthahahn/
Image Credits
Bio photo- Dina Kantor