Personal Commissions

A painting of you, not your face.

A painting made from your story, by hand, for you alone.

What this actually is

Most people think a commission means sending me a photo and getting a likeness back.

It isn't that.

We talk first. You tell me about your life, or the person this is for, or the thing you are living through right now. Then I spend weeks alone with your words, painting what I heard.

When it is finished, we get back on a call and I show it to you.

What my collectors tell me afterwards is not that it looks like them. It is that it knows them.

Three of them

They have almost nothing in common, because the women didn't either.

For a mother, of her two daughters.

For a family of three.

For a woman, of herself.

How it works

1. You get in touch

Fill in the form, or just write to me. Either is fine.

2. We have a call

Somewhere between twenty minutes and an hour, depending on how much you want to say. You tell me what this painting is for. I explain the sizes and the prices, and we work out together what size is right for your space. No obligation. Some people decide it is not the right time, and that is completely fine.

3. You book your place

Half to hold your spot, half when your turn comes and I begin. I work on one painting at a time, so when you book I will tell you exactly when your turn will be.

4. I sketch

Within a week of starting I send you the sketch I want to take to canvas. Nothing goes further until you are happy with it.

5. I paint

Four to eight weeks. I do not send progress photos unless you ask me to.

6. We get back on a call and I show you

Fifteen to thirty minutes, and you see the finished painting for the first time. This is my favourite part. Afterwards I email you photographs of it.

7. I finish it and send it to you

I cover the painting with a protective medium and let it dry for a couple of days. Then I roll it and ship it to you.

What I need from you

You don't need to know what you want.

You don't need a reference photo, a mood board, or the right words. Most of the women I work with arrive with a feeling and no idea how to describe it. That is my job, not yours.

You also don't need a dramatic story. Some of these calls are emotional and some are quite ordinary, and the ordinary ones make just as good paintings. A season of your life is enough.

You only have to tell me the truth.

Sizes

Larger is possible. We can talk about it. All prices include VAT.

Every painting is acrylic on canvas, painted by me. Shipping is included and insured, anywhere in the world. Paintings travel rolled in a tube. If you would rather receive it stretched on a frame, I can arrange that and I will tell you what it adds.

Questions people ask

Is it strange to commission a painting of yourself?

No. Most of the women who write to me are doing it for themselves, and nearly all of them mention feeling a little self-conscious about it at first. What they say afterwards is that they wish they had done it sooner.

Can it be about someone else?

Yes. Some are of the woman herself, some are of her children, her family, her mother. Some are gifts. It only has to matter to you.

What if I don't know what size I want?

Almost nobody does. I will ask about the wall it is going on and we will work it out together on the call.

How long will I wait?

Four to eight weeks of painting, plus however long until your turn comes around. I will give you a real date, not a vague one.

Do I see it before it is finished?

You see and approve the sketch. After that, no, and this is deliberate. A painting halfway through does not look like the painting it becomes.

What if I don't like it?

My policy is that I do not make changes to a finished painting, and I say that plainly. But if something feels wrong to you, I am not going to leave it there. It has happened once. A collector felt the colours were not what she had felt inside, she was right, I had sensed it too, and I repainted them. That was a conversation, not a returns policy. The sketch step exists so that this almost never comes up.

What if I change my mind after booking?

The deposit is not refundable, and I cannot take a painting back once it is made. It exists only because you asked for it, and it is not something I could sell to anyone else. I would rather say that plainly now than surprise you later. If you are unsure, take the call and do not book. There is no pressure from me.

How does it arrive?

Rolled in a tube, insured, anywhere in the world. Any framer can stretch it, or I can send it stretched for an extra cost.

What my collectors have said

A collector shared this the day her painting went up on the wall.

I was not expecting to cry.

I can't tell you how magical and how healing this process has been.

It will remind me of the spark that I still have in me.

A little about me

I have been painting full time for ten years. I live and work in Budapest, though I have never really been from one place. I was born in Israel to a Bulgarian family, grew up in Moscow, lived in Barcelona, and ended up here.

What I paint is how it feels to be a woman. I keep finding the same thread running through the women who write to me, the same experiences turning up inside very different lives. And at the same time each one of them is entirely herself, in all her moods and states.

More than twenty thousand people own my prints. My original paintings hang in homes from Japan to the United States, Switzerland, the Emirates.

With love,
Sandra