1999 Suzanne Hill

Portrait of Suzanne Hill, Strathbutler Award 1999

Portrait of Suzanne Hill, Strathbutler 1999 (photo – James Wilson)

… speak with the same intensity as a drawing, painting or construction. Sharing an idea, feeling or experience …

Her bold canvases and larger than life installation pieces captured the attention of Alex Colville, who together with Kathy Hooper nominated Hill for this recognition. Hill’s passion for artistic expression is evidenced in her volunteer work within the province as well as in her own dynamic body of work. A champion of arts education, artist’s support networks, local galleries and museums, Hill has balanced a teaching career and her own work for decades.

A graduate of Mount Allison and McGill Universities, Hill was characterized by Colville as “outstanding not only in drawing, painting and designing but also in art history, literature and philosophy”

In the artist’s words

What should an artist’s statement include? information about the artist? history? Influences? accomplishments? failures? inspirations?  Should it be about places? things? ideas? Answering these questions would perhaps be appropriate, but I find it difficult to choose words that will speak with the same intensity as a drawing, painting or construction. Sharing an idea, feeling or experience by making it visual is, I suppose, the way I communicate most clearly.

I work in various media, making series of images that I feel have the potential to connect on a number of levels. Ideally, the artworks are visual assertions comments, questions that invite a variety of responses, depending on an individual’s own experiences.