Hannah Batsel has the guts to sling a paintbrush – but if you’re not careful, she’ll get it all over your shoes.

“I don’t think too much about my [work],” she said. “I just spit it out. It’s something that needs to come out, so it does. It’s an art barf, I guess.”

Batsel, a sophomore art student from Marietta, has wandered many artistic avenues.

“You name it, I’ve probably tried it – with varying success.”

That includes sculpture, drawing and painting.

“I’m kind of a painting hobo,” she said. “I come downtown to find cardboard to paint on.”

Batsel also dabbles in print-making: “I hate the process, but I love the design.”

Batsel began putting her talent on paper in middle school with the encouragement of, strangely, her English teachers.

“Hopefully it wasn’t a hint not to go into English,” Batsel said. “I started off just drawing and making comic books, which I still do. My style is kind of cartoon-y and comic book-like.”

Since then, Batsel has developed an affection for the art of vandalism.

“I love graffiti artists,” she said. “I tried to go on this Banksy stint one time and went around spray painting rats on stuff. It was fun, but it wasn’t very sustainable.”

Other graffiti artists she enjoys are Jean-Michel Basquiat and Shepard Fairey.

Fans of Batsel’s artwork might be wondering – what’s her creative engine?

“It can be the stupidest things,” she said. “I studied abroad in Costa Rica, so I did this little series of paper sculptures of insects there. I love Chinese dragons, so I made a big dragon mask that I could wear around. [My inspiration] comes from completely random sources.”

Batsel’s preferred musical stimuli, on the other hand, is pretty specific.

“The more spastic the music I listen to, the more I get done.”

She cites two bands that get her creative juices flowing.

“One is Mindless Self Indulgence, which is ridiculous, and the other is Taraf de Haidouks … an old gypsy guy crankin’ away on a fiddle.”

When it comes to just throwing some color around, Batsel believes creating is in all of us.

“Everyone could and should make art,” she said. “I feel like everyone has some sort of creative impulse.”

Despite her zest for invention, Batsel’s head is secured tightly to her shoulders.

“I’d love to be a fine artist, but that works out for a pretty small population,” she said.

“Maybe I’ll go into teaching and corrupt children.”