Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Sara Hannon. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Sara , appreciate you joining us today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

The number one obstacle in my life has been self-doubt, or rather, a lack of trusting my intuition. I thought that there was a strict rule to life, to creating. A rule that everyone knew how to follow, except me. I was constantly looking for outside approval to be sure that I was remotely on the right track.
It took me a good long while to learn how to say the words “I am an artist” without feeling flustered and adding a ‘but…’ For at least a decade that sentence continued, ‘but… I am a massage therapist.’ It was my way of saying, “Fine, caught me! I don’t make a living as an artist. You’re right, I am just a dreamer.”
While, at 45, I could spend time lamenting that I am a decade or two behind in my “career as an artist” I would argue that I now know that there is no track aside from the one I am on. I could not have sped up my learning process because learning takes time. I would not be here today if I did not spend 15 years as a massage therapist. I did not have the freedom of the understanding I have now about how there actually is no one rule. There are societal expectations, social norms, but we are all ultimately defining who we want to be in the world.
For years, and to this day, some people find my paintings and drawings a little disturbing. “In a good way!” I’d hear but still be bothered by. I was depressed in my teens to early adulthood. “Cheer up!” “Smile!” “Why does everything have to be so dark?” As someone who was trying to follow that elusive rule, I thought that I was wrong to not be making cheery art. But here’s the thing, I didn’t want to look at cheery art. I didn’t want to make cheery art. I knew that being cheery was often an act and I wanted no part in the stifling of authentic emotions.
My years as a massage therapist taught me many things. I met so many people from so many walks of life. Why were they getting massages? Stress, tension, pain, a need of comfort, human touch. So many people are running on empty as a baseline. My art is an attempt to let people feel seen. Maybe they too have it ingrained in them that they should have a cheerful personae, but seeing one of my paintings may allow them a second to accept that there is more going on mentally, and that I see that.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

As I mentioned already, I worked as a massage therapist for 15 years. My time in that field gave me a great awareness of the movement of energy. The number one goal I’d have in a session was how to get the energy moving through a certain body part. I could put my hands on someone and feel a sinking feeling somewhere in my gut or a sorrow in the middle of my head. What could I do to balance that energy out? It took me a long time to accept this idea of working with energy. I was always so skeptical when co-workers talked about it. “Yeah, right you feel energy.” Finally, I had to admit to myself that that was what I did for a living. While some people were out there working their cerebral jobs, I was in a dark room moving invisible energy.
If I could accept that etherealness about massage, could I accept that about myself as an artist?
I went to art school 25 years ago because it is what made sense for who I wanted to be. I knew that I wanted to create, that I needed to create. While I received positive feedback, my lack of really understanding how I fit in as an artist led me to really internalize any real or perceived negative feedback. Mostly I got the impression that we students were all on a fools journey, no one makes it as an artist. That came from some professors, but also how the world likes to make creativity the butt of the Capitalist joke. Our flight of fancy will not pay the bills.
With a little internalized embarrassment for trying to be an artist and also from a deeper internal knowledge and desire, I enrolled in massage school. I had gone to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago where one does not need to declare a focus outside of “studio art”. I did not heed the warning to concentrate in a certain department and so I graduated with no solid marketable skills (I thought). So, off to trade school I went. Being a massage therapist means you don’t work a regular full time week, which leaves time for art making. I eventually was lucky enough to find a job that paid well and I started saving money hoping to eventually quit and focus full time on art. I didn’t actually think that I would do it, I mean, will my flight of fancy pay my bills!? But I finally did it in September of 2023.
Since then I have been working in my studio. It’s an exciting time. My paintings are very busy, energy flowing across the canvas in the form of faces and bodies. As our real bodies seem like a solid fixed entity, I know that swarming within there is so much more. The same with my paintings, there is no fixed image, it just keeps moving.
Ultimately, I make art to play with my perception of reality. Sometimes I paint what feels like an ancestor checking in or a specific old memory rearing it’s ugly head and why not? If i could let myself work in a dark room manipulating energy then why can’t I work with the same mindset as I create?
Ultimately, my goal is to be as honest and authentic as I can be. I am constantly searching for myself through lines and color and when people find themselves in my work I feel such a wonderful connection to reality.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative?

First off, I do not believe that there are non-creatives. I believe with a little space and maybe a little coaching anyone can unlock something creative within themselves. We all have the ability to imagine, which is creative.
I know that if I do not create then my mental health suffers which is why I put it front and center in my life.
I don’t know what to make of the world right now. Are we not in collective disarray? There are wars. There is racial injustice. Women are being swept back into the broom closet. The LGBTQIA+ community is being scapegoated as the ills of society. The rich are getting richer, which pisses us off while we ourselves dream of personal riches. Animals are cruelly slaughtered. The oceans are filled with plastic, so is our body. Should I go on?
I believe the cause of much of this disarray is a lack of individual creative thinking. My art makes an attempt at finding a universal energy. I make multi-faced beings because we all have so many faces. We are not just one thing. I think that if we could allow certain aspects of ourselves to come to light we would have a better understanding of other people. The fixed and dogmatic is not going to make an inclusive society. We need to allow our thoughts and our beliefs some fluidity.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

It all comes down to money, of course. During the beginning of the pandemic, on top of the money the government was allocating, I collected unemployment . There were a good several months where I was receiving $1000 a week which for my lifestyle; married, homeowner, no children, is A-OK, if not GREAT. I have never had a salaried job, so this was the first time I had dependable income. (Tip your massage therapist!!!!) During that time I was able to make art unfettered by money concerns. I felt like I was in a country that supported the arts. I could paint all day long without this nagging sense that I was being a lazy person for not making money, because I was “making” money. That was a little taster for me quitting my job. Although, now I have to remind myself that I do have a little freedom in the form of savings (some is pandemic money) and I don’t have to judge my worth on how much money is being direct deposited. It really is a struggle in this society to unravel who you are at your core from who you are as a money maker.
Ultimately, there needs to be more financial support for artist and creatives, but there also needs to be a shift in how we view these imaginative people. Conformity of thinking is more destructive than constructive in many cases. We need people to test our collective beliefs through art and literature.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://sarakatehannon.com
• Instagram: @sally_juniper