“I’m fascinated by transportation — the function of moving, transporting passengers to their destination, including their innate beauty.”
Public relations and marketing executive for hotels by profession, Mike Sagaran is a visual artist by vocation. He started painting cars and all things moving for as long as he can remember.
“I have always loved cars,” Mike begins. I am, especially drawn to the classics and super cars — they visually excite and inspire me. In my artist mind I see the VW Beetle, MB Gullwing, Jaguar E-Type, Ferrari and Lamborghini.”
“But, as I go about my daily tasks I don’t know what to imagine,” Mike laughs. “ Not necessarily what I paint, but I would love to have the classic cars as a collection, one day.”
It is not uncommon for lovers of cars to picture in their minds what life would be like if what they imagine in art were part of their reality. And as they imagine, they paint.
For life can turn out into all we imagine it to be… or so the song from a kiddie shoe goes… “here in the middle of imagination, right in the middle of my mind….”
“I would paint a classic Mercedes-Benz Gullwing,” he says. “I have painted the car several times for exhibits and commissioned projects.”
Do you dream cars? I ask.
“Yes, the iconic DeLorean from the classic movie Back to the Future.”
“I’m a big fan of impressionist art, from it the evolution f visual art into different movements such as expressionist, surrealism, contemporary and the French painters Claude Monet and Frederic Bazile,” he lets out an earful as I try to digest.
“Let me add, for the Northern Renaissance art, the masters that inpire me are Hieronymus Bosch and Jan Van Eyck.”
The future, the classics renaissance, contemporary surrealists — maybe that is the way Mike pictures cars. For an artist like him, there is no real order — just a need to transport other people into a world colorfully and technically created by him.
“There will always be additional elements that I include to enrich the stories of my paintings — but, at the center of all the paintings I make — the main element will always be cars and Vespas.”