Savana Ogburn’s eye-catching work feels like your childhood craft supplies box exploded onto your 
stack of teen magazines — and the result is gorgeous. Sublimely colorful and shamelessly camp, her collage and photography work plays with a wide array of textures and bright hues. Although she’s still a student at SCAD, 20-year-old Ogburn’s work has already been featured in Rookie Mag, Them Magazine, and Into More Magazine, and commissioned by brands including Refinery29, Nylon Japan, and Gucci Beauty.
Ogburn sometimes invokes a Wizard of Oz-like image of a past decade, and other times it’s kooky and modern, like her self-portrait as “the beauty queen of green beans.” Her work has also ventured into the three-dimensional — for a recent photography project which reimagines Adam and Eve as transgender, Savana got some help from her mom in constructing a full-size paper-mache tree.
Ogburn draws inspiration from the exaggerated, performative qualities of drag performance, and has worked with Atlanta-area drag queens such as Taylor Alxndr and Molly Rimswell. Like so many talented young artists, Ogburn has spent this summer soaking up the sights and sounds of New York City, but she’s now returned to Atlanta.
In our conversation, Savana allowed CommonCreativ a little insight into her growth as an artist, her inspirations, and her tactile approach to collage work.
CommonCreativ: How did you get into art?
Savana Ogburn: Both of my parents are creative and have always encouraged and inspired me to make things from a very early age. I can remember making all sorts of crafts, drawing, and painting all the time when I was really young. That eventually turned into me needing to make things and thus taking art classes and starting to develop a voice.
CC: What inspired you to do collage, and how did drag culture, queerness, and camp come to influence your work?
SO: I started doing collage for the first time when I first worked with Rookie Mag in 2015. I had played with mixed media before, but it was so prevalent on Rookie (artists like Eleanor Hardwick, Minna Gilligan, etc. were using collage all the time) that it seemed really natural to incorporate it into my work. I also want to create full worlds within my photos, and since I rarely have huge budgets for massive set design/locations, collaging in environments just makes a lot of sense to me. I also like the handmade feel and the ability to play with viewers’ perception. Photoshop also gets old fast to me, and I’d rather spend time cutting up photos with my actual hands than retouching on a computer screen.
As far as drag goes, I was introduced to RuPaul’s Drag Race my freshman year of college and haven’t looked back since. I immediately fell in love with the over-the-top and so often comical depictions of femininity (and otherwise) and knew I wanted to photograph queens. Which led to me experimenting with makeup for my Identity Crisis series, thinking a lot about gender presentation and performance, and eventually realizing my own queer identity. Now it’s incredibly important to me to make work about that — not only my own queerness but also work that represents a wide range of drag and queer performance. I love photographing performers that I admire because it allows me to bring them into my visual world and to show them looking like the badass characters that they are.
CC: In your art, what does femininity mean to you?
SO: As far as my personal presentation goes, I’ve always leaned femme. There have been times where I’ve tried to push back against it but it’s just who I am and how I’m comfortable, and including femme aesthetics in my work just feels true to me. I’m drawn to things that are visually over the top, saturated, and frivolous, and that frequently reads as “feminine” in art. It’s not even something I think about anymore when I’m creating work. There was a period of time where I was like, “I’m making FEMME art! Girl power!” and now I’m honestly just more interested in making what I want to make regardless of whatever binary someone wants to impose on it.
Artist Savana Ogburn | Photo by Jason Travis
CC: You’ve mentioned that film is a delicate medium, requiring much more time, effort, and money than digital. What’s the most important moment or scene you’ve captured on film so far?
SO: I have a pretty significant number of photos of my best friends and roommates, Kenedee and Kristen, doing DIY haircuts in the bathroom. It started when we were freshman living in dorms and has continued into our own apartment. Something about it is so sweet and intimate (no matter what’s actually being said in the moment, haha) that I feel super compelled to document it every time. Kills me!
CC: You mentioned in past interviews that when you were first starting out, you thought the Picnic-edited photos older girls were posting on Facebook were really cool. Do you feel sentimental about any certain era of digital or analog photography?
SO: Oh god, yeah. I loved Picnic so much — it was so corny and over the top and honestly inspired the hell out of me. So I definitely feel a little sentimental (and still a little embarrassed) about that. I also was really heavily into making dark, moody conceptual art on Flickr in like 2012-13ish and I kind of miss that. I was taking all sorts of bizarre stock images of like, fire and really gritty shit to layer over self portraits in Photoshop. I miss the process sometimes! But I don’t miss making sad photos 24/7.
CC: How do you navigate being an art student and an artist at the same time?
SO: Doing freelance work on top of school is difficult, just like balancing any other job alongside school is. But school does provide resources that I can use for that work which is so valuable to me. Making my personal work goes hand in hand with school, actually, because a lot of that work begins as assignments. Identity Crisis began as a final for an intro photography class, my Vampire Cowboy series was a final for a studio lighting class, et cetera. And it’s great because I can get professor feedback and really hands-on help, which has been so beneficial to me.
CC: What were you doing this summer in New York?
SO: I [was interning with] Refinery29’s editorial photo team, and exploring and hugging my friends. It’s been a great learning experience on all ends — figuring out how to navigate a career in art as well as just like, being a human being in a brand-new place.
CC: What inspires you right now?
SO: I’m always inspired by David Bowie. I saw the “David Bowie Is” exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum in June and it was so inspiring to see how hands-on he was with all aspects of his image. I’m also obsessed with Parker Day’s photos — her “Brand Partner” series is so wacky and fun.
The David Wojnarowicz exhibit at the Whitney was also so inspiring — I’ve been thinking a lot about the intersection of art and protest and seeing his body of work really got my gears turning. I’ve also been 
seeing a lot of incredible drag/burlesque in Brooklyn, especially at Switch n’ Play shows, and that’s been incredibly inspiring in every way. Queer brilliance!
CC: What are your thoughts on Atlanta’s art scene? Do you have a favorite Atlanta artist?
SO: I love love love it. Especially the queer community here — so many incredible artists. I’m obsessed with Barry Lee‘s photos and illustrations, Taylor Alxndr‘s music and drag, Jon Dean‘s photos, Tropico Photo. And so many more!
CC: If you could travel anywhere in the world for your photography, where would you go?
SO: I’m in love with Niki de Saint Phalle’s work, so probably her Tarot Garden in Tuscany. It’s this larger-than-life sculpture garden inspired by tarot cards and covered in mosaic. I look at pictures of it for inspiration all the time because it’s just so bonkers.
You can see more of Savana’s work on her website, Instagram, and Etsy shop.
