I didn’t choose art. It found me long before I understood it.

As a child in Cuba, my mother taught my sisters and me embroidery every afternoon. It felt like discipline then, but it quietly trained my hands. In 1968, we arrived in the United States as refugees, and life became about survival. Art disappeared for many years.

Later, living in France and Italy, I was immersed in museums and centuries of art. I didn’t study it formally—I absorbed it.

In the early 1990s, while working in the garment industry and driving through Los Angeles, I began painting, photographing, and creating collages. The city became my muse.

When I returned to textiles, everything came full circle. What was once an obligation became my language.

Today, I create one-of-a-kind works that live at the intersection of fine art and textile design—guided by intuition, layering, and material.

I make art to give permanence to what disappears, and to bring beauty to displacement.

Curriculum Vitae

Artist: Entire life

2008 - Present Sara Palacios Designs

1998 - 2006 Sara Palacios Designs Wearable Art 

Selected Exhibitions

2024 Del Alma, Latina Portraits, Vincent Price Art Museum at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.

2020 T. Elliot Gallery solo show "Conversations", Riverside, California

2016 Art Share LA, group show, “Close to Home”, Los Angeles, California

2013 Latino Art Museum, group show, “Vanities, Vanidades, Vanities,” Pomona, California.

2003 Brandstater Gallery, solo show, “Illusions and Transformations”, La Sierra University, Riverside, California.

2002 California Art Gallery/Latino Art Museum “Cuba Art Festival”, Pomona, California.

2001 California Art Gallery, “Clothes, The Human Body and Art: a Symbiotic Relationship”, Pomona, California.

1997 Latino Museum of History, Art and Culture, “Angels’ Ink” group show, Los Angeles, California.

1997 BATA Gallery, “Small Dreams”, solo show, Los Angeles, California.

1996 The Corridor Gallery, group show, E. Hollywood, California.

1996 Exhibition on the Arts and Crafts of Africa and the African Diaspora (in conjunction with Africa95), Library Foyer, School of Oriental and African Studies, London, England.

1996 Galeria Las Americas, group show, Santa Monica, California

1996 BATA Gallery, group show, Los Angeles, California.

1996 L.A. Art SEEN, group show, Santa Monica, California

1995 Galería Las Américas, group show, Los Ángeles, California.

1995 Art Studio Gallery, solo show, Santa Monica, California.

1994 Cabrillo Pavilion Art Center, group show, Santa Barbara, California.

1994 Galería Las Américas, group show, Los Ángeles, California.

1993 Galería Las Américas, group show, Los Ángeles, California.

1992 Phyllis Diller International, Beverly Hills, California.

1992 “Issues of Choice”, group show, Los Angeles, Contemporary Exhibition, Los Angeles, California.

Award

Bronze Award, Art of California Magazine, Discovery Award, 1993.

Publications:

DAILY BULLETIN: Inland Valley, July 5, 2001

LA OPINION: “Espectaculos” March 5, 1997

ARTE DE LAS AMÉRICAS, 1996, Galería de Las Américas, Santa Mónica, California.

LATIN STYLE, Vol. II No. 3 1996, Venice, California.

VECINOS DEL VALLE, June 1994, San Fernando Valley, California.

EASTSIDE SUN, July 1994, Los Angeles, California.

OTHER ACTIVITIES.

Summer 1996, Art in the Park in collaboration with the Latino Museum of History, Art and Culture.

October 1996 Para Los Niños in collaboration with the Latino Museum of History, Art and Culture.