by Christy Rodriguez de Conte

Tallahassee-born artist Sara Lea Miller paints and stretches her masterpieces, finding beauty in the balance of hard lines and color blends.

LeMoyne Arts will feature Miller’s work along with other local folk artists and their contributions to the visual arts in the community at the 24th annual Chain of Parks Art Festival, April 20-21. “Soulful Feelin’: A Folk Art Celebration” exhibit running in tandem with the festival will be on display from Thursday, April 11, through Saturday, May 18.

The trajectory of Miller’s artistry is not the usual story of a child discovering herself through art. She did not spend her life covered in paint. Instead, like many children born and raised in Tallahassee, she grew up in the country encompassed by nature. She spent her summers covered in the dirt and hay of a barn, surrounded by fawns and friends.

Though she was introduced to art history in high school, it was not until college that she had the pleasure of traveling through Europe and experiencing the masterpieces, viewing museums across the lands. She fell in love with the art she saw but never picked up the proverbial brush.

Fast forward to 2020. The world shut down, and our lives changed. For many, the solitude brought an odd sense of purpose and urgency. Urgency tied to time can lead to a leap of faith and starting something new. This is how it happened for painter Sara Lea Miller, who discovered her affinity for abstract art and deepened her love of the artwork she once admired.

Art has served as a place in Miller’s life for exploration based on the process of play. As a self-taught painter who turned to YouTube videos for knowledge on color theory and painting styles, she enjoys trial and error. “It was all experimenting and building to find where I am now,” says Miller. “I found happy accidents as I went. I liked the messiness of acrylic. [It] felt like me.”

Miller begins with a raw canvas, which she has rolled out and cut to size herself. When placing the canvas on the floor, she takes advantage of its natural waves to shape the piece. She almost always begins a project with specific colors in mind and a rough idea of potential marks and placement for each.

Miller enjoys using acrylics to juxtapose hard lines with soft, muted colors to create the appearance of a fluid and layered watercolor. To do so, she takes a thin layer of acrylic paint with some water and pours it onto the canvas. She scrapes it across, hoping to create an image that appears some areas are soaked with paint while others have drips organically spread. Miller has explored several ways to create her desired effect.

“I bought a few paintbrushes and received a lot of brushes from a co-worker who had their mother’s brushes. Eventually, I realized I wasn’t a traditional paintbrush kind of girl,” Miller said. “I experimented with several different types of brushes and tools, breaking them or adding stuff to them.” To avoid leaving brush marks, Miller created her own tool made from a long-handled kitchen scrubber with a yoga mat glued to its end.

After further experimentation, she finally settled on a 6-inch masonry brush, which she cut one-inch gaps into. Miller’s signature pour-and-scrape technique builds a sensory experience, layer by layer. According to Miller, it takes 24 hours for each layer of paint to dry; within that time, new colors and patterns take shape.

Miller then stretches the canvas over its frame, signs the painting on the outer edge so the buyer can rotate it in any direction, and varnishes it with a 40/60 water and fluid matte medium mix.

Read more on the Tallahassee Democrat.