Pop-Up Artist Suzanne Anderson

Featured Artist, Suzanne Anderson is back for the fall of 2019 as a guest artist for Pop-Up beginning Tuesday, September 24 through Monday, September 30. Read on to learn more about her inspiration, her process, and her work.

  

SEPTEMBER 24 to SEPTEMBER 30

I work in a wooded lakeside studio in Maine. It’s the perfect place to become immersed in creative exploration.  In the incredible beauty of my surroundings, I find myself powerfully drawn to the landscape. In 2016 I began a series of drawings at a micro scale. Closely examining and recording with drawings and photographs the tiny colorful lichen and fungus that abound in the forest and field. These drawings have been used in my enamel work, in my textile design work and in a further series of drawings that incorporate natural elements and sometimes humanoid characters. This continuing series is undertaken with an underlining response to worries over human rights and environmental issues. My work is a continuance of study along the lines of developing a symbolic language of expression that walks the line between abstract form and recognizable, though unusual, elements.

The drawing process is often started on an iPad with a stylus.  After roughing out, my work is completed on a larger screen and finally printed in small editions on high quality, acid-free, Epson Velvet paper. I work back into the prints with hand embroidered line, wool roving and sometimes found objects. The use of the sewn line introduces the hand back into a digital drawing and hearkens back to traditional “women’s work”.

While centered around lichen, mosses, and fungus, this work also explores the inner and outer landscape through the abstraction of the natural forms.  The tiny little arrangements and the incredible variety of these lifeforms offer lovely surprises to the senses. The life cycle through to decay creates endless fascination. These observations come back to me in my studio not only through my 2d work but also through the medium of jewelry.  My jewelry work has a natural, casual, organic feeling. It relates to color and form to the tiny worlds of nature that I am so captivated by.

The beautiful vitreous (hot glass) enamel colors and edges promote a feeling of transition, a going back to nature, a beautiful decay. In my jewelry, I use a variety of enameling techniques in the creation of my pieces. Sgraffito, sifting, painting, graphite drawing, and gold leaf are a few of the techniques I employ in my enamel work. I use hand formed and forged sterling silver, copper, and brass in my chain and findings. Each piece is finished on the edges. The non-enameled metals are either left with a satin finish or have a patina applied and are sealed with a museum quality protective wax.

To see more of Suzanne Anderson’s work, visit her webpage www.suzanneanderson.me

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