Sarira Sayad is a multidisciplinary artist, designer and entrepreneur, born on the Caspian Coast, currently based in Montreal and often found in New York City. Practicing arts and music since childhood, she later pursued technical and graphic design before attending McGill university, founding Canada’s first online resale marketplace for authenticated vintage luxury apparel and returning to her core passion of art after a decade of entrepreneurship. She is fascinated by energy, movement, transformation and transcendence — employing dynamic intuitive flow and deep insight to convey a mystical and magical story into our nature, future and truth.
How did you get into art?
Art was my form of self-expression as a young child. I was intensely curious about nature and animals, and would sit under tables for hours drawing what I had seen or imagined. As a teen, art was my outlet, including creating comic-book style stories in my spare time. Later in life, I learned more “practical” artistic skills in graphic and technical design, which I applied as an entrepreneur, but it was only a matter of time before I was pulled back to my original calling: creating art for the sake of creation and expression.
How would you describe your style? What makes your work special?
I tend to transcend styles and stereotypes, and so does my art. It doesn’t fit perfectly in any category. I currently describe it as visual philosophy. My style is semi-abstract with dynamically fluid lines that merge into meaning something beyond the form itself. It’s like a type of biomorphic abstraction — organic lines and shapes based on nature — that includes elements of calligraphy and geometry while insinuating broader philosophical ideas.
What makes my art unique is what makes me unique as an individual: I’m an independent thinker with an unusual life path, broad set of experiences and skills, forming depth of character and a very distinct perspective. My art is essentially creative contemplation and storytelling through that specific lens. I cultivate and employ intuition, intellect and ability in all my pursuits. The dichotomy of these elements makes my art multifaceted: fluid AND precise, organic AND intentional, abstract AND representational, while always true to my voice. I think that’s what makes it stound out.
How do you go about developing your work?
My work is usually contemplative. The creation is in flow state but it’s based on what I’ve observed and reflected on, about life or society in a given period of time. It therefore includes my own introspection and conclusions as well as current events and future projections regarding the narrative I want to explore. It usually starts with broad ideas and how we fit into them. I then let my intuition and imagination give these concepts form through my art. Sometimes this process is reversed — where a form I organically create generates the idea for the piece. There’s a constant feedback loop and it can go either way. I like to sketch shapes on paper first, let it simmer, abstract or minimize it further, and then build intuitively on that as an embedded reference when in creative flow state.
Who or what influences you?
The beauty and absurdity of life itself — I’m inspired by the magic of nature, the mystery of the unknown and its infinite possibilities. I’m intrigued by energy: it’s what we are and how we move, transform and transcend. I’m on a quest for truth and enlightenment through my art.
Make us curious. What are you planning to do next?
My first analog series Life Lines was foundational, intentionally bare, and will influence my future direction. I have so many ideas to expand on, I can hardly contain them and am excited to explore them. I’m always learning and growing so that affects how my art evolves. I’m progressively moving further into abstraction and experimentation, larger stretched canvases, playing with striking colours and new themes. My next series will be very different but will include elements of my signature dynamic lines. Stay tuned.
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