Featured Artist Susan Hunter Guise

Canadian artist Susan Hunter Guise presents a charming collection of landscapes created in pastel. Visit her website to see more of her portfolio.

 

 

I have been a creative all my life. My mother, a classically trained singer, claimed I’d sing songs she was practicing while still in my crib—without words, of course. A watercolor and ceramic artist herself, she was my first teacher. One of my earliest memories is of crying to her at a Christmas party because Santa didn’t give me a set of watercolors. The set was soon in my hands, and I still have it.

 

 

In grade three I started violin lessons, eventually earning an honors degree in violin performance. I have been part of many orchestras and chamber music groups, played on a real Stradivari, and performed with orchestras at London’s famed Royal Albert Hall.

 

 

While I still play violin, now my primary creative pursuit is painting, often plein air, using oils and pastels. Plein air has allowed me to experience the outdoors in a different way. I notice more about the subject than I would otherwise, feel more deeply, and enjoy bringing that feeling to life in my paintings. Usually I paint alla prima, which is Italian for “all at once.” I could spend an hour on a painting or six hours.

 

 

It took me a while to find my way back to art. Though my love of drawing and painting was always there — whether I was screen printing T-shirts for friends, using graphic design to make stickers and signage for my father’s business, or creating a comic strip — decades passed before I started to take it seriously.

 

 

After working as a music typesetter, an accountant, and the manufacturer of meditation cushions and mats, I rekindled my art journey around 2011 when I accompanied my husband Len to local art classes taught by plein air artists. I thrived again, falling in love with oils and the creativity plein air allows.

 

 

Art has brought me a deep sense of peace, complementing my Zen Shikantaza (“just sitting”) meditation practice. It allows me to connect with my inner self and express what I cannot say in words. It’s like breathing — when done right you don’t think about what you are doing, you just “do.”

 

 

Having honed my skills, I’m now busy exhibiting my work. In February, my exhibition Poems in Pastel was featured at the Barrie Art Club—oil and pastel paintings and a series of haiku, one for each pastel, inspired by my Shodo (Japanese calligraphy) classes.

 

 

My solo exhibition From Field to Canvas debuted at the Adjala-Tosorontio Municipal Center in Alliston, Ontario, moved to the Museum on the Boyne in Alliston in the spring and is now on display at Matthews House hospice in Alliston. I also have pieces in exhibitions in Toronto and Barrie, Ontario. I’m thrilled to be in this third, or maybe it’s the fourth, chapter of my life!

 

Susan Hunter Guise invites you to follow on Facebook and Instagram. 

 

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