Colorful Essence

Exhibition Dates:
* April 11 – October 11, 2024

Dominican University of California presents: Colorful Essence
artwork by Susan Searway-Fertig

Capturing the essence of a subject by focusing on their lines, patterns, textures, forms, colors, & shapes.

ARTIST STATEMENT

Since graduating from Dominican University of California with a Bachelor of Fine Arts emphasis in Digital Art and a Bachelor of Arts in Art History in 2004, Susan Searway-Fertig started up her own company Susan Searway Art & Design in 2006.

The art side of my business is my passion—producing, exhibiting, and selling my artwork. I am what you call a true Fine Artist, which means I work in a variety of media.

Currently I work in digital art, watercolor, photography, drawing, and painting, but I am always open to new techniques to convey my thoughts and feelings.

I look for stability in an unstable society. Based on this concept I have created my figurative series: Persona. Persona is a personal reflection that focuses on the harmony of the body and the soul: the physical versus the spiritual, represented sometimes as one, sometimes as individuals.

I try to blend the idealism of the human form in combination and contrast with the variety of people – people seen through the lens of reality varying in shape, size, and form.

I am also a dancer, so most of my figurative work focused on capturing the human form in motion/dance.  I like to use a lot of color, movement, and spontaneity in my compositions.

As for photography, I am a shutterbug. I will shoot anything and everything to find a composition. I mostly concentrate my work on nature. The most wonderful thing about working with nature as your subject matter is that it is ever changing.

Artist Robert Bateman states it best, “Everything in nature has its own personality.” You can never capture or see the same composition twice. There are always little nuances of change.

When you take photographs or observe wildlife, they almost never stay in that “perfect” composition you envision. Therefore, you have to do a lot of improvisation and creativity to get the composition you desire.

Whether I am working in photography, on a computer, or on a two-dimensional plane I try to capture the essence of my subject by focusing on their lines, patterns, textures, forms, colors, and shapes.

My hope is to find a unique perspective in all my work. Creating art is what makes me happy, so I try to focus as much time as I can on doing just that.

I love to share it with the community.  I am honored to have an art studio at Art Works Downtown, 1337 Fourth Street, Studio #32, San Rafael, CA 94901.