Wisconsin Life

Breathe out through your nose. Dawn Marie Svanoe is an artist. I'm usually stuck in the corner doing the black light makeup. She's not your typical artist. We do haunt makeup for a haunt out in Stoughton called Screamin' Acres. As part of Team Scream, Dawn Marie transforms faces into freaks. It's crazy busy. Along with ghoulish zombie and creepy clowns. It wasn't a big jump for me. After having done kids' face painting for a while, it seemed like a natural progression. A progression that sent her brushes down past the neckline. If faces were fun, imagine if you went even farther. I was wanting a bigger canvas. Bigger is better when your art is only skin deep. A lot of times I will draw 'em out. This is going to be a lot of swirls and curls and whatnots. I'm winging it. It's a totally different feel painting on a human than it is on canvas. Dawn Marie's human masterpieces can be mind-bending. The only limitations are her imagination. The blue and white China patterns that you see. I also was inspired by a little bit of the Norwegian rosemaling. I kind of tried to combine those two inspirations into one today. Eh, stuck my finger in it. Originally, I grew up in a little town called Loganville, Wisconsin. When I say little, I mean little. Dawn Marie took art classes in school, but when it comes to her body of work, she forged her own path. I'm completely self-taught. The first ones I did were just the backs of two of my nieces. Edward Monks' "The Scream" on one and then I did "Starry Night" by Van Gogh on another one. Not every response, but the majority of the responses I got about body art was, "You touch their private--?" No, my paint brushes paint that stuff. I don't touch that. Don't think of it as this taboo thing that you are seeing. Keep an open mind. And look at the body as the beautiful canvas that it is. Everybody's got everything that you're seeing in body painting, just in different proportions. But as far as myself feeling awkward about it, no. Not anymore. I want people to realize that body painting is an art. It's not just a passing fad. It's been around for thousands of years, in different cultures around the world. It's an ancient art form Dawn Marie highlighted in an exhibition called "Extinction." I wanted to mimic the tribal style of the Xingu Indians from the Amazon. And the idea behind that series was, "We are all one tribe, "and if we don't start treating each other as one, "we're heading towards extinction." We used all body types, all ages, all sizes. We had a woman who was amputee from just below the knee down. And they're beautiful pieces. That series had so much meaning that that's probably one of my proudest sets. Proud is one thing, but the process can be grueling for both artist and model. I've done body paints that have take up to nine hours.

whistling

That's the thing with me. I'll just keep painting and painting and painting. They get tired. They move. That's probably the biggest challenge, is knowing that you have to remember that this is a living canvas. You need to stretch for a second? Yeah. Seeing it in person is always so much better because you see the fluid movement of the body. You see it morph with every move the model makes. So every angle is a different picture. Dawn Marie would appear on the reality competition show "Skin Wars." With my piece, I've made a surreal chess board that goes 360 around the body. It started out with 12 of us. And then the very first episode someone gets eliminated. Her brush with stardom could be worth $100,000. I've got this. This my challenge... Stressful.

laughs

Very stressful. It was a lot of fun. I made it through the 1st episode, the 2nd episode, with a few scares, the 3rd episode, the 4th episode, the 5th episode. The contestant known as the "Glitter Queen" survived until episode 6. It was an amazing experience. And a transforming experience for Dawn Marie. I look back and go, "Wow." Everything I did in my life has lead me to this point. Never thought this would be an occupation. I didn't even know the occupation existed to be honest. I found the beauty in it and I just absolutely love it.