Susan Gardner (artist)
Encyclopedia
Susan Gardner is an American painter, photographer and poet known for her poems about nature and human relations as well as the intimately detailed photography especially of the landscape and plants. Her book of poetry entitled "Box of Light ~ Caja de Luz" is noted for its unique pairing of Spanish and English poems. Gardner's experiences living in Asia, Mexico and Europe have contributed to a visual style which may be called abstract naturalism. The development of this visual style parallels the evolution of her poetry, which is characterized by elegantly concise and direct language. Over the course of almost four decades her work has been widely published and exhibited. Critics since the 1970s to the present have frequently commented on the lyricism and rhythmic quality of her paintings and photography as well as her poetry. In each medium, her art is concerned with the natural environment, human relationships and the mutual influence of human beings with the landscape.
She graduated from Hunter College
, in New York, Phi Beta Kappa
and with honors. Her principal mentors were Beatrice Hyslop in history and Leo Steinberg
in art history. Gardner went on to attend graduate school at Johns Hopkins University
where she studied political science and economics. Later in life, Gardner did graduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania
in landscape architecture.
In 1969, Gardner's career as a professional artist began in Seoul
, South Korea with studies in Chinese landscape painting with Park Se Won, the well-known painter, who was then the Chair of the Fine Arts Painting Department of Seoul National University
. After living in Korea for five years, she had developed a deep interest in calligraphy and began studies in painting. At this time she also resumed the habit of keeping a journal in poetry.
In Japan, Gardner studied for two years with calligrapher Tanino Shigeko in Nishinomiya
and then lithography at the Atelier Petit in Tokyo with Gaston Petit, the artist printmaker. Her first professional exhibition was in 1973 at the gallery of the Mitsui Bank in Kobe, Japan. The work rapidly evolved from the early classical influences and became more experimental and abstract. She incorporated new materials, sometimes painting with pine needles, mops, or other unconventional substitutes for brushes. The painting of this period often incorporates literary content and was the first occasion for her to compose short poems in Japanese.
Her paintings are signed with her pen name, Sekkei, which translates as Snow Valley although both photography and poetry are signed with her English name.
In the 1980s, in Mexico, she began to paint with oil on canvas, experimenting with traditional materials as her work became more abstract
. Her photography was first exhibited publicly in 1998 at St. John's College Gallery, Santa Fe, simultaneously with the publication of her first book of poetry, Intimate Landscapes.
The influence of Buddhist philosophy
, which first appears in her work of the 1970s, continues to be an ongoing theme.
and later came to distinguish her poetry as well.
Gardner's painting, photography and poetry are infused with a sense of lyrical spontaneity, of freshness in both form and content. She explores and illuminates the relationships between individuals, society, and nature. She has the ability to extract contextual meaning from the subtle undertones of her surroundings and associations in an exceptional way.
(T)he inspiration behind the images (is) Gardner's awareness of human interaction with history, tradition and the land. Gardner infuses her photography with an appreciation for line and a sense of stillness and simplicity.
"Gardner is an artist of atmosphere. Her style is unpretentious, austere, yet various.... The geometry of her transparencies bring to mind lex parsimoniae, or the law of parsimony.... Gardner's syllables, round as stream pebbles, are reminiscent of Albert Einstein's paraphrase of Occam's razor: "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not one bit simpler." Although the English-language poems are slightly familiar in phrasing at times, the lovely cousinship of two languages—Spanish and English—may be compared to the song of a musical instrument whose two strings, bowed or plucked, resonate with others in rich harmonic overtones.... The musical vowels of her poetry give us a quiet assurance centered upon domestic spaces and natural settings, each word hovering in its own luminous space, although some poems hint occasionally at unrest, violence, and global conflict."
Early life and education
Susan Gardner was born in New York City in November 1941. From early childhood she wrote prolifically, drew and painted. Her public debut was at the Flushing Public Library where, at the age of nine, her work was shown with a group of teenage students.She graduated from Hunter College
Hunter College
Hunter College, established in 1870, is a public university and one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York, located on Manhattan's Upper East Side. Hunter grants undergraduate, graduate, and post-graduate degrees in more than one hundred fields of study, and is recognized...
, in New York, Phi Beta Kappa
Phi Beta Kappa Society
The Phi Beta Kappa Society is an academic honor society. Its mission is to "celebrate and advocate excellence in the liberal arts and sciences"; and induct "the most outstanding students of arts and sciences at America’s leading colleges and universities." Founded at The College of William and...
and with honors. Her principal mentors were Beatrice Hyslop in history and Leo Steinberg
Leo Steinberg
Leo Steinberg was an American art critic and art historian and a naturalized citizen of the U.S.-Life:Steinberg was born in Moscow, Russia and grew up in Berlin, Germany. He was the son of Isaac Nachman Steinberg. He studied at the Slade School of Fine Art...
in art history. Gardner went on to attend graduate school at Johns Hopkins University
Johns Hopkins University
The Johns Hopkins University, commonly referred to as Johns Hopkins, JHU, or simply Hopkins, is a private research university based in Baltimore, Maryland, United States...
where she studied political science and economics. Later in life, Gardner did graduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
in landscape architecture.
In 1969, Gardner's career as a professional artist began in Seoul
Seoul
Seoul , officially the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea. A megacity with a population of over 10 million, it is the largest city proper in the OECD developed world...
, South Korea with studies in Chinese landscape painting with Park Se Won, the well-known painter, who was then the Chair of the Fine Arts Painting Department of Seoul National University
Seoul National University
Seoul National University , colloquially known in Korean as Seoul-dae , is a national research university in Seoul, Korea, ranked 24th in the world in publications in an analysis of data from the Science Citation Index, 7th in Asia and 42nd in the world by the 2011 QS World University Rankings...
. After living in Korea for five years, she had developed a deep interest in calligraphy and began studies in painting. At this time she also resumed the habit of keeping a journal in poetry.
In Japan, Gardner studied for two years with calligrapher Tanino Shigeko in Nishinomiya
Nishinomiya, Hyogo
is a city located in Hyōgo, Japan, between the cities of Ōsaka and Kōbe. On April 1, 2005, the city of Nishinomiya celebrated its 80th anniversary. It is best known as the home of Kōshien Stadium, where the Hanshin Tigers baseball team plays home games and where Japan's annual high school baseball...
and then lithography at the Atelier Petit in Tokyo with Gaston Petit, the artist printmaker. Her first professional exhibition was in 1973 at the gallery of the Mitsui Bank in Kobe, Japan. The work rapidly evolved from the early classical influences and became more experimental and abstract. She incorporated new materials, sometimes painting with pine needles, mops, or other unconventional substitutes for brushes. The painting of this period often incorporates literary content and was the first occasion for her to compose short poems in Japanese.
Her paintings are signed with her pen name, Sekkei, which translates as Snow Valley although both photography and poetry are signed with her English name.
In the 1980s, in Mexico, she began to paint with oil on canvas, experimenting with traditional materials as her work became more abstract
Abstract art
Abstract art uses a visual language of form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. Western art had been, from the Renaissance up to the middle of the 19th century, underpinned by the logic of perspective and an...
. Her photography was first exhibited publicly in 1998 at St. John's College Gallery, Santa Fe, simultaneously with the publication of her first book of poetry, Intimate Landscapes.
Primary influences
Her experiences living in Asia, Mexico and Europe have added both depth and dimension to her art. Each culture, each language, and each landscape have influenced her development and can be seen in the evolution of her work. Her poetry is influenced in its restrained style by Chinese and Japanese aesthetics and poetry.The influence of Buddhist philosophy
Buddhist philosophy
Buddhist philosophy deals extensively with problems in metaphysics, phenomenology, ethics, and epistemology.Some scholars assert that early Buddhist philosophy did not engage in ontological or metaphysical speculation, but was based instead on empirical evidence gained by the sense organs...
, which first appears in her work of the 1970s, continues to be an ongoing theme.
Style
From the base of representational sumi-e painting, learned in Korea and Japan, Gardner evolved a style which may be called abstract naturalism, seeking to capture the essential qualities of the subject, sometimes with altered perspective or using only a fraction of the subject to represent the whole. This characteristic is exemplified in her calligraphyCalligraphy
Calligraphy is a type of visual art. It is often called the art of fancy lettering . A contemporary definition of calligraphic practice is "the art of giving form to signs in an expressive, harmonious and skillful manner"...
and later came to distinguish her poetry as well.
Gardner's painting, photography and poetry are infused with a sense of lyrical spontaneity, of freshness in both form and content. She explores and illuminates the relationships between individuals, society, and nature. She has the ability to extract contextual meaning from the subtle undertones of her surroundings and associations in an exceptional way.
(T)he inspiration behind the images (is) Gardner's awareness of human interaction with history, tradition and the land. Gardner infuses her photography with an appreciation for line and a sense of stillness and simplicity.
"Gardner is an artist of atmosphere. Her style is unpretentious, austere, yet various.... The geometry of her transparencies bring to mind lex parsimoniae, or the law of parsimony.... Gardner's syllables, round as stream pebbles, are reminiscent of Albert Einstein's paraphrase of Occam's razor: "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not one bit simpler." Although the English-language poems are slightly familiar in phrasing at times, the lovely cousinship of two languages—Spanish and English—may be compared to the song of a musical instrument whose two strings, bowed or plucked, resonate with others in rich harmonic overtones.... The musical vowels of her poetry give us a quiet assurance centered upon domestic spaces and natural settings, each word hovering in its own luminous space, although some poems hint occasionally at unrest, violence, and global conflict."
Selected lectures and presentations
- Artscape, Toronto, 100th Anniversary Celebration, Toronto Island, 2009
- Día del Libro, National Hispanic Cultural CenterNational Hispanic Cultural CenterThe National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque, New Mexico is an establishment for preserving and promoting the culture of the Spanish-speaking world...
, Albuquerque, New Mexico 2009 - Swarthmore CollegeSwarthmore CollegeSwarthmore College is a private, independent, liberal arts college in the United States with an enrollment of about 1,500 students. The college is located in the borough of Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, 11 miles southwest of Philadelphia....
, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, 2008 - Festival of the Book, New Mexico Women Authors, Milner Plaza, Santa Fe, 2008
- Southwest Literary Center, Recursos, Santa Fe, 2007
- Asian Arts Society, ASHLAND, Oregon, 1998
- New York Public LibraryNew York Public LibraryThe New York Public Library is the largest public library in North America and is one of the United States' most significant research libraries...
, Cam Memorial Lecture, New York 1988 - University of Pennsylvania, Pre-Columbian Society, Philadelphia 1988
- New York Public Library, Rare Book Room, consultation on ancient Korean books 1987
- Dard Hunter Museum, Papermaking Conference, Appleton, Wisconsin 1987
- Folger Library, Washington, D.C. 1986
- Smithsonian Institution, Freer Gallery, Washington, D.C. (for Smithsonian and Freer staff) 1986
- Library of CongressLibrary of CongressThe Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
, consultation and staff workshop on Mexican pre-Columbian paper 1986 - Commentary for KBS-TV, 5000 Years of Korean Art, Asian Art Museum of San FranciscoAsian Art Museum of San FranciscoThe Asian Art Museum of San Francisco is a museum in San Francisco, California, United States. It has one of the most comprehensive collections of Asian art in the world....
1986 - Commentary for Canal 11Canal 11Canal 11 can refer to:* Once TV - A Mexican television channel* Repretel 11 - A Costa Rican television channel* Canal 11 - A Honduran television channel* Canal 11 - A Haitian television channel...
, Caligraphía, Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes, Mexico City 1985 - Canal 8, Noche a Noche, host: Félix Cortés Camarillo, September 27, 1983