Oh boy, I’m very excited. You know I go thru the highest of highs, then crash to the ground? Well, this time I’m doing something good for my future as a fine artist…I’ve been accepted to study classical art under a great Artist: Eduardo Salazar!! I am over the moon! I know it will take years of dedicated study, but I will soar to new heights.,.All the beautiful images in my head will have new ways to be rendered in my hands, with my new skills, new ways of seeing.
I dreamed, ALL MY LIFE, to study under a great Artist…now , finally, this dream is reality. I hope you will come along on this incredible journey,!
I must say, Covid was no picnic. But I have much to be grateful for, so I won’t whine. My work is selling and I am in 3 gallery shows at once…reason to DANCE and SHOUT! This Saturday, October 8th,2022 is ArtWalk. I am excited to AGAIN have work at
Five Deuces Galleria! The show is entitled “BLACK and WHITE with a Touch of Color”, and I love the theme. It really had me pushing myself to new artistic heights and I created the BEST Suncatcher to date! Unfortunately, my Surface Pro is in the throes of Death, so I can’t post an image just yet. But I will, never fear, Dear Reader! I’m back in Black and White, better than EVER!
Then I decided it was high time I got serious about my art, in a financial sense. After all, that’s what artists are supposed to do right? Look for angles, ways to promote myself, improve my lot in life. My life is already half over, so make hay while the sun shines, right?
. Wrong. My rebellious side decided I don’t need anyone to finance my art. I can scrape by. I will be discovered by accident. So I lost all my wind in my sails. I will try very hard to gather myself together.
My Founding Artist painting: The first of my works to be placed in The Ryan Licht Sang Bipolar Foundation’s Permanent Collection!
Fittingly titled “Crossing the Deleware, Well Aware” it shows my journey from despair and being held back by my past to shedding the overcoat of depression and walking into the sunlight of my artistic future! I based this title on the little “George Washington” Dude lurking down in the bottom center of the painting…See his funny hat?
My “Doubting Suzie” Ways
Ok, friends, here’s the deal: I quit working as Frank Strunk III’s intern last week. Why, when I was enjoying learning from him so much? Why, when my mind was blooming open to all kinds of brilliant metal working techniques, and my mind was being blown by his artistic vision?
“Why in the world would you do that Susan Todd?”, Susan Todd asked Susan Todd.
I figured out the answer to that yesterday, although the reasons I gave Frank were that
A. I need to focus on my work I already do, cause it’s what I do. (Huh?)
B. I am doing a piece about my Dad and I’m an emotional landmine.(Hmmmm….What?)
C. I have been invited to a big event and need to focus.(Nope.)
D. Too many scattered efforts make Suzie nuts. (Now THAT makes sense)
Did I do the right thing? I wasn’t sure, because I really want to make metal art. I’m frequently making impulsive decisions and regretting them. He was generous with his time, his tools, opening his shop, his art and heart to help an emerging artist. And I bailed, just when I was really digging in.
I hate how my Bipolar Disorder makes me run Soooo Hot and then drops me on my doubtful butt. But it did, and here I am. Have I done what I said I was going to do? Well, yes. Yes I have. So that is good, I really have benefited from focusing on less! I have finished one of the pieces for the new INSIGHTS V call and started 2 more. I entered the Art of Possibilities Show in Missouri with 3 works, and finished 2 Grant applications plus am working on a third. And this third one is a doozy.
I didn’t get the last three I applied for, but I’m getting better all the time at writing them. This new one I am having trouble writing, but that is ok. I AM REACHING OUT!! Oh, and I finished my Art Business course that the St Pete Arts Alliance gave me a scholarship for!
So, have I been working, and trying and FIGHTING for myself?
Yes! YES!! YES!!!! Making connections and forging ahead, breaking new ground in new and exciting directions. Learning new marketing skills and remembering old ones I had forgotten. Benefiting from taking little risks and meeting new artists.
Now that I have written this I am astounded at all I have accomplished in the past 2 months. I really am a creative Powerhouse! Cutting thru the choppy waters like a PRO! Go Suzie, Go Suzie!
There is NO limit on my creative potential! I can SOAR! Look at me go!!
What did I dream of then ? The freedom to create new art, better art than anyone had done before. I dreamt of sculpture, glorious-creamy-marble-gleamy sculpture. Human form expressed in visions of living flesh to make one weep.
Pushing the limits of what had gone before, finessing my gift to a razor fine point that would etch images so tantalizing that Albrecht Durer would be green with envy. I had no doubt in my teenage grandiosity that these goals were within my reach, I knew I was “that good”. All the tools were laid before me, I believed they would always be freely given by a grateful world, an appreciative audience who would grease my path to slide into the role of a modern day Michelangelo, only in female form.
KODAK Digital Still Camera
Perhaps I dreamed a bit large, but how wonderful to entertain such beliefs! With no guardrails to hem in my imagination my art soared, with no thought to the cost of materials or the the limiting exhaustion that real world work brings.
Well, guess what? I am making those dreams a reality today. I found someone who is willing to give me a chance, an opportunity to learn from his experience. I gathered my courage and kept asking, even when it seemed like I was getting nowhere. After following up on a suggestion a local CAD artist made to seek out this artist (thank you Alex!); I am proud to say I am learning from metal artist Frank Strunk III.
My dreams are NOT dead, I AM following my passion. I have the drive and vision, now with a little funding I will be soaring again! Soaring! On riveted metal wings, in welded metal carriages, in sculpted hot-air balloons and on the backs of giant imaginary sea creatures! Watch me soar, man!!!
Yes, I want to evoke emotion. I want my art to stir feelings, awaken buried longings. I want you to identify with the people in my artwork, see something of yourself.
I’ve tried so hard to reach others close to me, people who should have supported me in my trials. Who turned their back on me. I have tried to explain myself, given access to my thought processes in the hopes that some one out there can understand their mother, sister, daughter. Understand that those of us touched by this fire didn’t ask to be different.
Expand reality. Allow the viewer to delve into their own psyche…Give them permission to explore their perception of what is ‘normal’. Allow the viewer the chance to explore their entrenched beliefs without ridicule. Give them room to adjust their perceptions in their internal dialogue
This Artist is changeable, like the wind. I dance from one canvas to the next, one substrate to the next in an endless flow of ideas. To stop the flow of creativity is to stop my heart from beating. My Art from beating.
Being bipolar causes duality of purpose in me, and in my work. SIMULTANEOUS urgings: High, Low, Sideways, Backwards; Round. And yet , somehow, a cohesive whole is made.
I AM STRONG TODAY. I AM FREE OF THE BAGGAGE OF MY PAST TODAY.
I RUN UNDER A SAILING SKY, WILD-EYED and BREATHLESS… there IS a way forward for me… I WILL FIND IT. MY ARTISTIC VISION WILL NOT BE DENIED. I AM GOING TO MAKE PUBLIC RECYCLED METAL SCULPTURE. IT WILL BE IN PARKS AND GARDENS, IT WILL CELEBRATE THIS GLORIOUS ACT OF LIVING.
Back when I was a semi-pro pool player I had a mantra, because I was a clinch player. I came back when I was down, and that can demoralize an opponent, when you can beat them. But it wasn’t about that, not for me. It was staying in the game, never quitting, never saying ‘die’.
This quote has been attributed to many, so I will attribute it to an anonymous kindred spirit:
“It’s not the dog in the fight; It’s the fight in the dog.”
I have tried to associate myself with the local metal sculptors here in St. Pete, I have offered my labor free, begged for apprenticeships, offered to be the coffee runner, the shop cleaner, the grinder… I’ve been here 4 years now, and I feel choked and thwarted.
I know I’m older, I know I’m a woman, I know I’ve got marks against me as someone with “disabilities”. BUT I’M STILL HERE, AND MY VOICE WILL BE HEARD. What I have to contribute HAS VALUE! I can work most men under the table, even in the shape I’m in. (Ok, I could work my ex-husband under the table, which isn’t sayin’ much cause he was usually loaded!! But I AM a very hard worker…)
I’m strong as an OX and twice as GOOD LOOKING!!
So, while I have been quietly seething here in Pine Bay, creating my works on canvas, on board, on paper…. Painting my recycled furniture and selling cute little cat pictures…. THERE is a SHE -TIGER here in this cage…and I have found a way out.
I am NOT giving up, I am not going anywhere, and I’m certainly NOT GOING QUIETLY!
So, whether you see me shooting across the sky on the back of a winged Andalusian Stallion, dashing past you in my ‘souped up’ Kia Soul, or building a mind-boggling , solar powered work in a local park, be forewarned…
Out of the Gutter Art 
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