Michael Sowa

Michael Sowa (born 1945) is a German artist known mainly for his paintings, which are variously whimsical, surreal, or stunning. His paintings often feature animals and are titled in English and German. Sowa studied at the Berlin State School of Fine Arts for seven years and worked briefly as an art teacher before focusing entirely on his career as a painter and illustrator.

A book of 50 paintings titled Sowa's Ark : An Enchanted Bestiary (ISBN 0-8118-1415-7) was published in 1996 (ISBN 193143275-9). He also illustrated "Esterhazy, The Rabbit Prince" by Irene Dische and Hans M. Enzensberger (ISBN 097027683-4) (first published in German as "Esterhazy. Eine Hasengeschichte"). He is the illustrator of The Little King December (ISBN 9780747575597) and A Bear Called Sunday (ISBN 158234929-0) both authored by Axel Hacke.

He was the cover artist for several albums, including two covers for The Beautiful South's Miaow and for their single "Everybody's Talkin'."

He gained new followers for his work on the 2001 film Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain where his art on the walls comes to life. Sowa contributes illustrations to the satirical German magazine, Titanic, and he also did the art work for magazine covers of several well-known periodicals, most notably the December 2, 2002 issue of The New Yorker.

His art is widely available as posters, notecards, postcards, and calendars.


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