Sara Boland

INTERVIEW WITH KATE HARTMANN

Sara Boland was born in Colorado, USA. She was the eldest of two girls, Jen is her sister.  Her mum (Jeanne) is an editor, dad (Chris) was a vet and is now a consultant with the Ministry for Primary Industries.

Sara attended Hoon Hay Primary School in Christchurch for a brief period before the family moved to the Kapiti Coast where she attended Raumati Beach Primary School.  Her fondest memory of primary school is of building giant ‘nests’ of grass clippings on the back field at Raumati Beach school.

At Kapiti College Sara enjoyed Art and Horticulture, and performed well academically. However it was hard for her to fit in and it was a relief for her to finally leave there.

“Art has always been the raft onto which we climb to save our sanity” –Dorothea Tanning.

After college she attended EIT (formerly Hawkes Bay Polytechnic) studying a Diploma of Visual Arts and Design, and graduated in 1994.   Here is how Sara describes her time in the Hawkes Bay;

“Three years of amazing hands-on experience led by very inspiring tutors.  Lots of different media covered; drawing, printmaking, painting, photography, silver-smithing, tool making, casting, welding, weaving, papermaking, woodworking. “

“Freedom in the final year allowed us to write our own programmes and learn self-motivation and good work habits.”

For the next 15 years or so she worked mainly as a jewellery designer and maker before finding her current love of working with textiles.

SARA DESCRIBES HER ART PRACTICE, ASPIRATIONS, INSPIRATIONS AND GOALS

In the past several years Sara has been exploring fabric, pattern and stitching in a variety of forms including textile jewellery, hand made dolls, collage and hand stitching on paper.

“I work from my home studio making textile art pieces.  I have designed and made a range of ‘stitching kits’ as a little side business. The Dowse art gallery shop has been selling them for me, but I would like to have them in a few more outlets.”

“I work mainly with textiles, this has been a recent change (I was a jeweller).  I am interested in traditional skills and techniques and applying them in a new way, exploring texture, and pattern. Textile artists I admire greatly are Alice Kettle, Tilleke Schwarz and many others, they just get on and do their work, I think textiles as an art form is taken a bit more seriously overseas. I was very privileged to take part in the Kapiti Artist’s Focus last year at Mahara gallery and I am preparing work for a show at Tutere Gallery in June 2017.”

Sara lives in Waikanae with her husband and three daughters and works from her home studio which is quite small but well placed in a much loved garden. Sara is also a member of the Kapiti Coast Quilters Guild of which she is one of the youngest members.

"I want to make beautiful things, even if nobody cares” - Saul Bass

Sara can be contacted through Tutere Gallery and her work is often on show there.