The Fairy Society

Possessing the mixed features of a fairy and touched by an angel, as her mother says, Sara was brought into this world in the month of November 1981. It didn’t take long for her parents to see the natural talent in the long fingers Sara was blessed with. Drawing faeries, mermaids, and all things Disney soon started to fill all types of paper and daydreams. The influences of her parents strongly increased Sara’s creativity; her father being an art teacher, her mother a craft creative, and sending her to the Edmunds Academy of Fine Arts elementary school. The art of fine arts, music, and culture were ingrained from the start. She was awarded a scholarship to attend an art class at the Des Moines Art Center, where today she in turn teaches children and teenagers.

Sara’s work comes mostly from self-motivation to learn the human figure. She worked from Disney paper dolls, comics, magazines, and photographs. It was a shock factor when she attended the Minneapolis College of Art & Design only to find she had many misconceptions of how everything was to move. It was liberating when she found she could draw without a reference and took whimsical lines by the stronghold. She found that watercolor and ink provided the visual aspect she was feeling inside. Now Sara’s work flows, flies, and moves freely incorporating elements of design and color. Her studies included graphic design, observation, illustration, advertising, and art history. Though fantasy art had always been the main subject matter for Sara’s work, it wasn’t until her junior year of college that she was told by an instructor to look into history for inspiration and composition. This opened an entirely new book to her work. She traveled to Glasgow Scotland to study abroad at the Glasgow School of Art and dived deeply into fairytales, mythology, symbolism, Mucha, Waterhouse, Mackintosh, Froud, and Pre-Raphaelites. Sara’s Senior Show was focused on mythology and folklore, the Tuatha De Danann, and hidden meanings in Celtic art. She thought she knew where she was going and felt confident in the next steps of her career.

In the more recent years the journey has turned and has influenced Sara’s work even more increasingly through personal battles and blessings. Her visions were enlightened by her boyfriend Sterling who opened a new doorway to a new faith, Christianity. Finding more strength and inspiration in this spirituality, Sara’s work has become all encompassing for love, peace, harmony, and honor. Not feeling pressured to do what is expected of her as an illustrator, but to find her own originality. Her watercolor paintings strive to tell a story about passion, strength, true love, battles, princes and princesses, and heavenly realms. Her faeries and mermaids have the glow of angels, and her angels the humanity of Eve. Not leaving her studies behind or her love of fairytales, she makes it a point for children and adults alike to understand the importance of imagination, fairytales, and the story we all sigh for.

Today Sara resides in Iowa, her hometown, with her cat A.T., continually painting, managing her work online at Dreamflier Studios.com, loving her soldier Sterling, being there for her friends and family, and waiting in anticipation as to what the new day brings. Her work is a part of her life, ingrained into her soul, and a gift she is thankful for every moment.

"It is my hope that I inspire others with visions of spirit, love, and imagination."
- Sara M Butcher