Sam Shaker

[email protected] http://sam-shaker.artistwebsites.com http://www.saatchiart.com/[email protected] Tel: 07986176429 FROM PARIS TO SOHO-MY BIOGRAPHY I was born in Cairo, my humble upbringing made me ambitious so I started my career as an artist after obtaining my degree in Fine Art from Leonardo da Vinci academy of art. My dream was to work in Paris, on arrival I made my way to the French Metropolis of art.I found work in Montmartre as a street artist. Montmartre famous for its bohemian life style and its wonderful sights: Sacre Coeur, Place Due Tertre, has been the home of street artists for hundreds of years, they gather from all over the world to showcase their art, find models and live the freedom that is the lifestyle of the freelance artist. Famous painters, such as Van Gogh, Picasso, Henri Matisse 'the master of colour' Joan Miro and Toulouse Lautrec the painter whose work captured the spirit of bohemian Paris in the naughty 1890's spent their time there. I was greatly inspired by the works and bohemian life style of Toulouse Lautrec & Picasso so I choose to follow their footsteps in the hope that one day I would paint celebrities and models and make my mark in the art business. I saw my drawings, body painting and face painting as a useful way of supplementing my income. My technique is classic / abstract and serialism. I draw my influences from the great masters while still creating my own style.There are two mutually exclusive approaches in my art, one can demand that the individual features of a person should be recognizable while at the same time aiming at a radical simplification of forms in geometrical patterns, which is maintaining the balance between the two main ideas “Naturalism and Abstraction” neither of these two principles can occur without the other. It was a struggle to keep going but it was an exciting new experience for me. My greatest enjoyment was visiting Les Jardins de Giverny (where Claude Monet and Henri Matisse painted their masterpieces) it’s a paradise of amazing landscapes, where I spent many happy weeks. I loved going there and returned often to paint, sometimes alone and sometimes with girlfriends. I considered this to be the most significant part of my career as an artist.Paris became like a second home to me with the abundance of people wanting to have their portraits done. The more portraits I painted the more experienced I became and I learned to ex