29 Dec Illuminations: Ones to Watch

Encaustic painter Suzanne Truman offers up a glimpse into a possible truth inspired by the natural world through layers of paint and wax. Although somewhat abstract at first, each piece reflects the Western external landscape as well as an emotional, interior landscape. Her colors — informed by maps and grids, flocks of birds, and pastures moving through the seasons — celebrate the earth and embrace the viewer in a kind of blindfolded innocence. 

After the thick paint is laid on, Truman then gouges the surface, scratching in marks, codices, symbols, scraping and sometimes adding strata to further instill her unique sense of place. 

Her work has been acquired for both private and public collections including the Nicolaysen Art Museum, Casper, Wyoming; the University of Montana Fine Arts Museum, Missoula, Montana; The Cancer Treatment Center, Charleston, South Carolina; the Waller-Yoblanski Collection, Washington, D.C.; Spink, Butler and Clapp, LLP, Boise, Idaho; David Quammen; and Bananas Bar, Lexington, Kentucky.

In 2009 Truman was awarded the LEAW Foundation Fellowship, a one-month fully-funded artist residency at Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Amherst, Virginia; in 2001 she was given the Florence B. Anderson Memorial Award in Painting, and in 2000, she was juried into the Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, New York, New York. 

Suzanne Truman is represented by the Stewart Gallery, Boise, Idaho; Fresh Paint Art Advisors, Culver City, California; Stellers Gallery, Jacksonville, Florida; and Betsy Swartz Fine Art Consulting, Bozeman, Montana.