How Art Made Them Find Their True Self as an Artist | Marie Magnetic, Carol Santos and Anna Collevecchio
What happens when artists peel back the layers and let us in not just into their studios, but into their lives, their memories, and journeys of finding their true self? In this article, we’ve had the privilege of hearing from an extraordinary group of women artists Marie, Carol and Anna who generously shared not only their art but the deeply personal stories that fuel it.
Their journeys are as unique as their brushstrokes. Marie channels emotion and experience through vibrant, experimental techniques that reflect her connection to nature and inner transformation. Carol weaves personal and cultural memory into every piece, using recycled materials, storytelling, and community collaboration to preserve the past while dreaming into the future. Anna explores themes of nostalgia, family tradition, and Brazilian heritage, working with natural pigments and repurposed materials that echo the hands of her grandmothers and the passage of time.
Some of these artists came to their practice through childhood wonder; others through trauma, illness, migration, or motherhood. They’ve painted through grief, stitched through silence, sculpted through longing. Whether self-taught or academically trained, each artist uses their practice as a way to process, to remember, to resist, and to reconnect with themselves, with others, and with the larger world.
So what have we learned? That art is more than just what we see—it’s survival. It’s storytelling. It’s reclamation. It’s joy. And above all, it’s a deeply human way of making meaning from our lived experience.
Marie, Carol and Anna remind us that creativity isn’t linear; it spirals, loops, pauses, and pulses. Their work carries the weight of history, identity, memory and the lightness of imagination, color, and hope. So step in. Look closely. Listen deeply. Let their stories move you.
How Marie Magnetic Uses Art to Challenge Society and Share Her Inner World
Marie Magnetic is a self-taught visual artist from Chicago who works with paint, collage, and found objects to tell stories of both personal and collective experience. As a queer, Jewish, Indigenous, and neurodivergent woman, Marie explores themes of identity, marginalization, and social justice. Her work often reflects everyday struggles and surreal visions, offering a window into the contradictions of modern life.
Marie draws deeply from her lived experience to explore what it means to be “othered.” Her art acts as a response to growing up in a small Michigan town where she witnessed addiction, racism, mental illness, and poverty. These observations now form the backbone of her socially conscious practice, which critiques societal norms while inviting empathy.
Marie thrives on experimentation—both in form and message. Absurdity, surrealism, and satire guide her process as she reimagines the world through a lens of color and surreal imagery. Her aim is not just to provoke thought but to spark social awareness through creativity
Though mostly self-taught, Marie has taken community art classes and holds a Bachelor of Science in Psychology from Central Michigan University. She worked in social services before rediscovering her love of art during the COVID-19 pandemic. Since then, she has received grants from the Foundation House, the Haven Foundation, and the New York Foundation for the Arts, and held her first solo exhibition at Little Broken Things in 2023.
As an artist, I aim to think about the world differently, question societal norms, and consider a greater social consciousness.
To learn more about Marie, click on the links below.
Why Carol Santos Turns Family and Memory Into Living Works of Art
Brazilian-born and Atlanta-based, Carol Santos is a multidisciplinary artist who paints, sculpts, and performs to explore themes of childhood, family, and cultural preservation. Through recycled materials and natural pigments, Carol weaves stories that bridge the past with the present.
Her children, family history, and memories of growing up in Brazil are central. During the pandemic, she recreated a beet juice recipe with her daughter—a practice passed down from her grandmother—which sparked her ongoing natural pigment series. Her work is rooted in these intimate moments of continuity.
Carol often invites her children and friends to participate in her work, fostering a sense of shared narrative. Her practice is about more than expression—it’s about creating inclusive spaces and living history through collaborative storytelling
Carol’s art has been shown in the US, Brazil, and Europe. She brings multiculturalism to the forefront, reflecting on the layered experiences of migration, motherhood, and memory. Her artistic mission is supported by her academic pursuits—she is currently completing her MFA at the Savannah College of Art and Design—and her work with museums and arts organizations
My goal is to create art that elevates viewers’ understanding of the human experience, encouraging reflection on their journey of self- discovery.
To learn more about Carol, visit the links below.
What Anna Collevecchio’s “Temporal Psychoexpressionism” Reveals About Time and Emotion
Anna Collevecchio, an artist born in St. Petersburg, Russia, blends her love of ancient fresco techniques with modern abstraction. Her unique style, which she calls Temporal Psychoexpressionism, captures fleeting emotional states using rhythmic brushstrokes, textured layers, and gold leaf.
Raised in an artist family—her mother a well-known cityscape painter and her grandmother the director of an art school—Anna was surrounded by creativity from a young age. She earned a BA in Graphic Arts and a PhD in Communication Studies before turning to fine art as a deeper form of expression.
Her creative process begins with an emotional spark, often tied to a specific place. She observes rhythms in the environment—dust swirling, rippling water—and translates them into hundreds of brush or marker strokes. Each piece becomes a meditative record of a moment in time, sometimes including a stroke count in the title.
Inspired by early Christian iconography, Anna recreates the matte texture of frescoes using a custom spackling paste and watercolors. The gold leaf embellishments give her work a radiant, sacred quality, connecting spiritual tradition with the ephemeral present.
I was always terrified of the power Time has over human minds and bodies. We don’t own Time, we don’t know how much Time we’ll have, and we don’t know what kind of rhythm it will play on our souls.
To learn more about Anna, click on the links below.
Spending time with Marie, Anna, and Carol has been like sitting down for an honest, heart-to-heart. Through their stories, we’ve seen how art can be a way to heal, to remember, and to speak when words aren’t enough. Each of them creates from a deeply personal place, yet what they share feels universal—love, loss, strength, and hope. Their journeys remind us that art isn’t just something we make—it’s something we live.
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