Born in Paris to Polish-Jewish immigrants, Sam Szafran spent his formative years in the French capital. His early artistic development was significantly influenced by his time in the La Ruche artist colony, where he associated with figures such as Alberto Giacometti and Henri Cartier-Bresson, who encouraged his focus on drawing.

Szafran is best known for his obsessive, highly detailed depictions of indoor spaces, particularly spiraling staircases and dense, overgrown greenhouses. By eschewing oil paint in favor of pastels, he achieved a unique luminosity and depth, often utilizing distorted wide-angle perspectives to create a sense of claustrophobia or infinite expansion within his subjects.

Throughout his career, Szafran maintained a reclusive lifestyle, focusing intensely on his studio practice. His work has been the subject of numerous retrospectives in France and Switzerland, cementing his reputation as a singular figure in contemporary figurative art who bridged the gap between traditional draftsmanship and modern psychological intensity.