"I AM" by Suzy Schultz  

30 x 40 inches, oil over acrylic ground on panel, original --unframed

Suzy Schultz has little formal art training but was exposed to art at an early age through her mother, who is a painter. She graduated from Auburn University with a degree in Mathematics Education and taught high school for 4 1/2 years. Taking a leave of absence, she spent a year overseas in Poland. On returning, she did some part-time graphic design work for a local missions agency and was eventually hired to help with their publications. There she was mentored and nurtured in her artistic talent and encouraged to paint for illustrations used in the magazine. When her mentor and boss left to go on the mission field six years later, she was told she needed to leave her job and paint full time, which she did.

 She has painted full-time since 1995 and has won many awards for her work. Her work has been featured in American Art Collector, Drawing, and Watercolor Magic magazines. She has also had work published in art books by Rockport Publishers and International Artist Publishers, as well as Strokes of Genius 2, Strokes of Genius 3, Northlight Publishers, and Splash 13: Alternative Approaches, F & W Media, and will be in the upcoming books Strokes of Genius 6 and Art Journey: People. Her work has been juried into many shows, most recently The Philadelphia Watercolor Society, National Watercolor Society, the San Diego Watercolor Society, Southern Watercolor Society, Fort Wayne Museum of Art Contemporary Realism Biennial, and “Georgia Artists Select Georgia Artists” at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Atlanta, GA.

"There is a first innocence – a beauty that is young, unmarred, untested.

There is a second innocence – one in which the beauty is a result of the scars borne from the battles of life. I am interested in this second innocence.

I work the surface. I sand, layer, and scar, wanting to reproduce a piece that has a patina of age, and it is out of these surfaces that figures emerge. I seek figures, faces that seem to be familiar with the tensions of life. That bear some battle scars. And yet, have victory, even if a crippled or limping one.......Susan Schultz"