My name is Sarah Lajealle (née Nash). I was named after my great aunt who was the first woman doctor in Europe. I believed if I was ever to “become” an artist I would drop my maiden name Nash and go by Lajealle, given it is truly one of a kind… Google the name. I am the writer behind the concept of heART of hOMe and an artist who claims to be a “Jack of all Trades” as I work in all mediums.
I was born, adopted and raised in Cleveland, Ohio. I was an All-American high school swimmer who also dabbled in ballet as an outlet to my “serious sport.” I spent any free time I had growing up reading, writing and creating. I attended Purdue University for English and History and later Indiana Wesleyan for Biblical studies. I decided somewhere along the way that I never wanted to stop learning and felt that my favorite place to live would have been in either the Libraries of Alexandria or Congress.
Two years ago, when I started my residency at the Magnolia Art Exchange, I was what most would have seen as completely put together on the outside. I was managing some of the best restaurants in Central Florida and had my work on display at the Appleton Museum of Art. I have been interviewed by Canvas Rebel Magazine. Influential Women Magazine wanted to name me as their “most influential woman in Florida,” and I have recently been approached by MSN to be featured as a “trailblazing entrepreneur” of 2026.
Due to unforeseen circumstances, I hit what most would consider rock bottom recently. I lost my little rental in downtown Ocala, the only place I had ever hoped to call home, in a city that had granted me the courage to grow wings and allowed me to soar within their thriving community of artists. A week before I was to give everything away, a family I had only known for two months said “not on our watch” and offered me shelter within their own. Because of their generosity, I was able to reclaim the last months of my residency at the Magnolia Art Exchange and finish my final show.
I knew God was speaking through my art as the work I had on display at the Museum was something only He could have designed. I had a thought to recreate Jacob’s ladder and at first wanted to picture it unlike any version I had seen, from the Heavens down to Earth. I kept feeling led to paint the ladder as a DNA strand although I could not comprehend why, as it did not make sense to me. The day I was to turn the pieces in, a short came across my YouTube from Pastor Troy Brewer out of Texas talking about how the cross bars of our DNA strands spell out YHWH.
A year and a half ago, I met the first boy I had ever loved while managing a restaurant in The Villages, the first time at a journalism conference our senior year of high school. Thirty-two years ago, I took the cross my grandmother gave me off my neck and told him we would meet again. I don’t believe in coincidence. Before he left this time, he asked for my Spotify handle… What has played out over the course of the second year of my residency is what could only be called a “twin flame” connection. A term that I had never heard before last year but is summed up by two individuals sharing the same soul.
We did not speak in person much, more so through music. I’d liken it to “mix tapes” that were not always pleasant as I tried to tell him what all had happened in my life since we last saw each other. I saw all of my mistakes that I had allowed to get the best of me. Through his patience, I was able to unpack pain I didn’t even know I carried. What I now know is that I had to heal all that had been broken. Through the artwork I produced the first year of my residency, I brought all of these old wounds to the surface and cleared them.
This year, I have reworked old pieces that brought up that pain and transmuted them into something more than I could even have imagined. My final show of this residency explains this connection and the surreal journey I have walked with him. Throughout this time, I tried to explain to friends what was happening, not sure I understood it myself. I know some thought me crazy, as I also thought myself at points along the way. Others tried to empathize, yet given the fact that no one had seen him in person, I looked crazy to commit to a journey that no one could see but me.
Since I was young I have had a firm belief that we are not meant to conform to this world. More so, we are divinely designed by our Creator. What I have come to learn is that each of us were born with a purpose. God works everything to His glory and my “job” is to trust in something I cannot see but feel with remarkable certainty. My artwork and my life are a testament to a life lived in service to Him.
It may be the end of my time at the Magnolia Art Exchange, but the beginning of my new journey starts now.
