Carina Sanders - Multi-Media Artist

I was born in Germany. My father was in the United States Air Force and met my mother, a nurse, while deployed in Germany. My education includes both German and American schooling. I attended Arizona State University's Herberger College of Fine Arts and graduated with an emphasis on Studio Art Cum Laude. My honors thesis exhibition was titled "Of Nature" and featured artwork inspired by Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay: "Nature".

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Art was always a favorite subject of mine. Disney was a great inspiration to me. I started by drawing my favorite Disney characters. My absolute favorite is Winnie the Pooh. I watched all of the art/animation behind the scenes available to me at the time.

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My other primary source of inspiration is nature. Nature is so full of beautiful colors, shades, shapes and everything is open to interpretation. I love getting low to the ground and close up to really study and observe. That is part of the reason that my favorite artists are Claude Monet, Vincent Van Gogh and Auguste Renoir...to name just a few. 

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I also really love video games and am so impressed with how realistic graphics have become. There is so much artistry that goes into creating a video game, similarly to creating art work for a movie.

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As far as media, I prefer pencil and charcoal. Charcoal gives subject matter, especially animals a real soft and life-like texture and feel. Pencil allows for great attention to detail. Luckily I've had the opportunity to play with watercolors,  acrylics and chalk pastels. I've even tried my hand at printmaking and some 3-D media in the form of ceramics. I had the privilege of working on a Bamboo digital drawing pad, early generation, which was fun, but I enjoy the feel and satisfaction of utilizing tactile media on paper.