Sarah Manuel

BIO

Sarah Manuel (she/her), also known as S. Manwell, American adoptee currently based in Kansas City, MO. She is a printmaker and artist interested in themes around identity and longing. Her work has been exhibited and collected regionally at venues such as Bradbury Art Museum(AR), Kansas City Art Institute(MO), Library of Congress (Washington DC), and Kansas City Artist Coalition(MO). She was a Wingate Fellow recipient in 2024 and is projected to receive her BFA in printmaking from the Kansas City Art Institute in spring 2025.

Artist Statement

As a Chinese adoptee raised in the Midwest, I often feel isolated from a culture I lack. To remedy this feeling of longing, as a child I reached for pop culture, music, and fiction to fill the gaps I had growing up. When symbols began appearing in my prints, “subconscious fingerprints,” such as a scratchy chicken drawing or board game pieces, they became links to remix and invent a language to represent my experiences. I explore feelings of displacement and longing, yet also invite play and amusement of vibrant color. The colors I choose are important, as they reflect the inner child—bright and imaginative—that travels between the space of reality and fiction. Fluorescents are a key area of interest as they are prominent in children’s toys, exciting parties, and mysterious bioluminescent sea creatures. They, fluorescents, exist most naturally in a space removed from our own, where foreign is natural and familiar is boring. Much like a Rorschach or reading tea leaves, the intended message often emerges hazily from an undefined space, leaving room for play in a world of cultural dissonance.