I have lived as a sole proprietor for nearly two decades, not including my second-grade sticker cartel. People always say to me, “You make your living…as , um, an artist? How?” 

Simple: I’ve been guided by angels who have helped me create a sustainable Planet SJ.

People Who Make Planet SJ Possible

OPERATIONS

• Marc Bonne and Mike Curato (utility-in-fielders): On speed-dial… 
• Erik Gould (photographer) Erik documented what we affectionately call “the Beast” – my 9 x 12 foot painting “Mercy43.” 
• Michael Ferrier and Joyce Bettencourt (computer programmers): solar customers cum comrades who have taken up my cause in the virtual world. Responsible for engineering my digital puzzle project and, often, my sanity at local markets… 
• Todd Roufs (web guru): I refer everyone to this gentleman who now resides in Texas, so help us all. Calm, creative, comic. The best. 
• Pat Zacks/Camera Werks (framer): Midwife for my works on paper… 
• Person I Still Need to Meet (studio manager): I know you’re out there somewhere… 

CARD AND PUZZLE STOCKISTS 

• Rhode Island: Black Pear, Camera Werks, Cluck, Different Drummer, Epilogues, HeARTspot Gallery, Lore Collection, Made in Warren 
• Massachusetts: Broadside Bookshop, Eureka Puzzles, Fuller Craft Museum 
• Minnesota: Common Good Books, Minnesota Center for Book Arts 
• New York: Twenty-Sided Store 
• Washington: Seattle Public Library Bookshop

REPRESENTATION 

• Katja Goldbeck-Horz (German art dealer): Angel of my life. 
• ArtProv Gallery (New England gallery): Michele Aucoin and Nick Paciorek do right by their artists. With cake, to boot. 
• Margaret Cunningham (proprietor): She bought one of those “fish with an umbrella” drawnigs oh-so-many years ago…

IF I HAD A BOARD OF DIRECTORS

• Miriam Sharman: Until a series of phone calls with my brilliant cousin I thought “Operational Drag” was something you did at night club. 
• Marc Polish: This toilet paper tycoon taught me the difference between a contract and common sense. 
• Carolyn Ou: I’ve renamed her Rabbi Carolyn for her wisdom and human relations acumen. 
• Mary Judge: Eagle eyes often find themselves editing my prose… 
• Bill & Linda: Maimonides 2.0+Love = parents 

HEART & SOUL 

My extended family, my friends, my creative soulmates, collaborators, customers, and community – may you all meet face to face one day!

Bio 

Sarah Jane Lapp is an American artist. She also likes to make people laugh. 

Over the last twenty-five years she has made images for stage, page, screen, and bean, producing essay-films, hand-drawn animations, short plays, jigsaw puzzles, music videos, telematic productions, anti-fascist greeting cards, and photovoltaic solar installations. 

Two very funny Minnesotans spawned SJL and sent her to earn a B.A in Playwriting at Brown University before she moved even farther east as Fulbright Scholar at Filmova a Televizni Fakulta Academie Muzickych Umeni (FAMU) in Prague. She apprenticed at Studio Bratri v Triku and completed her MFA from the Department of Filmmaking at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. After a brief stint in NYC typing for R.O. Blechman and Wall Street tycoons alike, Ms. Lapp spent the next eight years in Seattle, vending her drawings at Pike Place Market, contributing editorial cartoons to the Hearst daily, Seattle Post-Intelligencer (RIP!), and producing animations, primarily for social justice and arts-dedicated entities. These animations, including her collaborations “Chronicles of an Asthmatic Stripper” and “Chronicles of a Professional Eulogist” with contrabassist/composer Mark Dresser, earned SJ internationally peculiar museum and festival exhibitions, an almost-Genius Award, and numerous stalkers. Lured back East for teaching appointments at Wellesley and Harvard, Sarah Jane dropped anchor in Seekonk, MA with her partner, the musician Skyjelly. Living among turkeys, deer, and other people’s dogs Sarah Jane uses comedy and compassion to generate free and off-grid renewable energy. 

FELLOWSHIPS

Massachusetts Cultural Council (2013),Santa Fe Art Institute (2011), Seattle City Artist’s Grant (2010), Artist Trust/Washington State Arts Commission Media Grant (2007), the Alpert Award in the Arts/UCross Residency Award (2007), The Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center (2007 -in collaboration with Mark Dresser), Artist Trust Gap Grant (2004), the MacDowell Colony (2001, 2000) a Jerome Foundation New York Media Grant (2000), a Foundation for Contemporary Performance Art Grant (2000), Anderson Center for Interdisciplinary Arts (2000), the Atlantic Center Center for the Arts/Civitella Ranieri (2000), and an Artslink/CEC International Partners Media Grant (1997 with Jenny Perlin). 

Press

ACROSS THE POND

• Featured on Bettina Munk’s and Björn Hegardt’s Lines Fiction, June 2012
• Galerie Berthold Naumann announcement, May 8, 2009
• Stuttgarter Nachrichten, May 6, 2009
• Sarah Jane Lapp in Stuttgart, Stuttgarter Nachrichten, April 5, 2006 (PDF)
• Modern Art in Alten Rathaus, Filder wochenblatt, April 6, 2006 (PDF)

ACROSS THE COUNTRY

• SJL, as seen in Achitectural Digest
• BostonVoyager, Check out Sarah Jane Lapp’s Artwork
• Reporter Today, “MIW” To Join The Party On Art Night Bristol Warren August 29
• SouthCoast Today, Solved: Puzzle artist finds a place at Groundwork Gallery
• Artscope, Various Exhibitions at ArtProv Gallery
• Brown Daily Herald, Sarah Jane Lapp ’94 brings paint, puzzles to campus
• Artscope, Saluting Talent
• Boston Hassle, SKYJELLY – “The 6 Is Silent”
• San Diego Reader, Mark Dresser: Defining the Solo Contrabass at UCSD
• Jazz Messengers, Synastry
• Outside-Inside-Out, Christmas Gift Suggestions for that Avant Garde Lover in Your Life
• Robert Bush’s response to “Nourishments”
• Seattlest, October 20, 2009, I Wanna be a Professional Eulogist
• The New York Times, A Film Festival for a Jewish World That Spans the Globe, by A.O. Scott 
• Seattle Post-Intelligencer, March 15, 2007, The artist lineup for Tacoma Art Museum’s Northwest Biennial is irresistible
• The Enterprise, October 1, 2008, Lapp Exhibit at Anderson Center
• The Stranger, September 10, 2008, 2008 Stranger Genius Awards Shortlist: Film

Cross-examination

• “Paintings by Sarah Jane Lapp,” Paula Martiesian/BankRI, July-August 2016
• La Trobe University, Screening the Past, What Should I Make Up? An inquiry into autobiography. Interview with Sarah Jane Lapp.