Hi, my name is San :)

I'm a visual artist and tattoo artist with a passion for creating meaningful and raw pieces that evoke deep emotions. For this reason, I especially love working on projects about mental health journeys, depression, therapy, and even spirituality.

Jumping from drawing to painting and often mixing different techniques, I love to create pieces on instinct. Being fully present, drawing acts as a catalyst for raw emotion before it is verbalized and intellectualized.

I am fully influenced by psychoanalysis and the way everyone experiences emotion.

Although I love to draw for myself in my studio, it's exciting and enriching to be able to work with clients and explore their stories through a drawing, either for their skin or their walls.

My dream as a child was to live from my drawings and paintings, and it's been amazing to experience this journey through commissioned art and tattoos.

You may also know me as "San Deuil", which has been my artist name since I started travelling for tattoo conventions. There were too many "San" on the venues, and I needed to differentiate myself. My tattoo shop was called "Deuil Merveilleux" (Wonderful Mourning), and I adopted part of it as a moniker.

ABOUT THE WORK

When you remember an emotion, what does it feel like? It could be that clinging tension in your belly or holding on to your throat. An emptiness running to your core. We don’t live the same experiences, but we all feel the same emotions.

In these drawings, ink washes reveal a form, sometimes human, sometimes monstrous. Some marks are like shouted writings, or archetypal symbols to translate what happens in your mind and body when you’re upset. These forms are an attempt to testify to anxiety, trauma, love, and fear, from an angle other than personal feeling.

Text by Mélodie Oralarkaya