Battery Park City Library is excited to welcome back Manhattan artist Sue Burickson. Her exhibit, Wisdom and Wonder: At the Intersection of Poetry and Painting, will be on display at the BPC Library from April-June 2022. Below, Sue tells us what inspires her to create and explains why the library provides a unique venue for her work:
1. Tell us a little bit about your current exhibition at the Battery Park City Library.
Wisdom and Wonder, my current exhibition at the Library, is about what happens within us as we experience the intersection of words and images in a work of art.
2. Where do you find inspiration for your work?
For centuries, art has inspired literature and poetry, and literature and poetry have inspired art. While the visual impact of a picture can be immediate, poems and quotes can communicate in a more subliminal way, unfolding through the senses as you digest them. Not until the end (or often much later) do we feel their resonance or have their meaning dawn upon us.
3. What inspired the theme of this exhibition?
I have spent a lot of time in hospitals caring for my sick husband over the years. During hospital visits, I would bring my pens and watercolors along and paint while he slept. I left the paintings for him to see when he woke up. Hospital staff showed them around and discovered that patients, relatives, and caregivers felt they were helped by seeing my paintings. I began to add words. The paintings in this show were made during that time. Sayings, poetry, and quotes from different traditions were my inspiration. The idea that I can help people cope with challenging situations through my art is what keeps me working every day.
4. How do you think the library setting affects the people who are experiencing your art?
The library environment is a soul-nourishing place for people of any age and a natural focal point for the meeting of minds. Libraries are free, safe, educational, and quiet. They are the heart of their communities. By virtue of this non-competitive, safe, and quiet environment, visitors have the freedom to become more receptive to new influences and to each other.
5. Where can we find you and your work online?
You can view my work on my website, sueburickson.com, in my Etsy shop, https://www.etsy.com/shop/enlightenedheart, or at myenlightenedheart.com. You can also add your contact information to the sign-in sheet provided by the library to join my mailing list. By doing so, you will receive updates on upcoming exhibitions, as well as advice about different artistic mediums and answers to questions you may have. You can also reach me directly at sue@purplecometdesigns.com.
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Sue Burickson is currently a teaching artist at LMCC working at the Project FIND annex, where she is working on a Forever Stamps project scheduled from April through June. If you wish to learn more or sign up for this project, please contact Program Coordinator Rachel Eisenman at the Hamilton Adult Center at reisenman@projectfind.org.