Jan Serr creates paintings, works on paper, prints, photographs, and artist-made books. She generally works on a series of paintings and prints which share a common subject or theme, but which are expressed in different media. Examples of recent works include Leaves and Branches, a continuing landscape series, and Summer Dances, a new series of monotypes. In recent years, Serr has explored photography more deeply with exhibit/book projects such as Then & Now and Smoke & Mirrors using the sensibilities she has developed in her other work. Serr is known for her rich use of color and strong composition.

Born in Dayton, Ohio, Jan Serr grew up in Arizona and Wisconsin. She earned her BA and MFA from the University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee where she studied with John Colt and Schomer Lichtner. Early influences include Matthias Grunewald, El Greco, Frans Hals, and 20th century Expressionists such as Max Beckman, Oskar Kokoschka, and Emil Nolde. Early in her career Serr taught at the University of Wisconsin—Stevens Point and Sheridan College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning in Oakville, Ontario. In 2014 she returned to teaching, leading a monotype course at Penland School of Crafts in North Carolina. Serr’s work is in major private, public, and corporate collections in the United States and Canada (her first professional exhibition was with Marlborough Godard Galerie, Montreal, Quebec). She has participated in the Art in the Embassy program of the U.S. State Department three times. Serr has gallery representation in Chicago, IL and Milwaukee, WI.