Artist Profile: Susan Christian Is Still Not Letting People Go to Sleep

by Lynette Charters Serembe

Walking into Susan Christian’s show at Childhood’s End, an array of various calming blues in rectangles welcome you in. After dwelling with them a while, you notice an optical illusion made by a combination of windows receding into barely suggested landscapes/seascapes/mountainscapes, juxtaposed with protruding constructed surfaces. The show could easily read as an installation constructed of painted rectangles on lathe or board.

There are isolated flashes of bright red, also the merest suggestion of a narrative; as if she’s kindly offering up more help should you be drawing a blank in your own imagination. As a last resort, the titles hold Christian’s own playful, or punchy narratives.

Among the calm depicted, is tension in the bright saturated red, there is also tension in some of the titles such as Rise Up, Lost Love, Edging Away, and EAT, EAT! Serenity and tension live in the same space in her art, as it does in most of our lived spaces and experiences.

Christian lives next to a very calm section of bay on the Sound, and her environment is very much an influence in the peace and calm reflected in her works.

If you’ve ever been lucky enough to spend time with Christian, you’ll know her as kind, intelligent, sharp witted, and a good listener. She has lots of questions and tells lots of anecdotes. If you say something she doesn’t agree with, she’ll let you know her own thoughts in a heartbeat and will welcome a debate with an open mind and convivial humor.

Christian has been central to the arts community in Olympia for many years. She’s lived here for 54 years. She was a therapist for 24 years where she held creative writing groups as therapy. Marilyn Frasca (Evergreen faculty emerita) informed us that Christian taught a variety of programs at Evergreen and was guest artist and lecturer in many interdisciplinary programs where being both an artist and art therapist was a major contribution.

Irritated that there were few places for artists to show art in Olympia, Christian started Salon Refu Gallery downtown, which she ran from 2011 to 2017. There she showed many local artists, held poetry readings, book readings, and artist talks. It was a joyous hub of the local arts community, a den of discussion and learning. She points out that art needs to be visible, and, not one for complacency, she was “not going to let people go to sleep”.

And she is still not letting people go to sleep.

Speaking of her work and her current show, Christian says she very intentionally doesn’t paint pictures of things, nor suggestions of things either, she describes her work as someone “touching the surface.” She says that “if you put a rectangle on, or in a rectangle someone will find a way to see something they can name, because we don’t really like to be in the dark. We look for something to connect with. The quieter the image is, it’s halfway harder or halfway easier to look for connection because … we search for something in our memory bank for meaning. If you make a painting that lets you fill in the narrative, it’s like offering a gift. The gift of space for your imagination.”

She considers that people may think she’s lazy because she’s not telling the whole story, but effectively she is being generous because she allows you to tell your own story. She points out that maybe she’s very simply and intentionally making room for the story of their own. The artist is offering a place; the viewer fills in the space with the wealth of their experiences.

Referring to her years as a professional therapist, she says that therapy involves a lot of listening, and in this way, she’s still making room for that. Christian says, “If no one bothers to listen to you, they won’t know what you think.” With her paintings, she gives context and is very welcoming of what you think, regardless of if you want to tell her or not.  She’s still acting as a therapist, a listener.  “Paintings without content are good listening paintings.” She says, “I don’t feel I have a message; I’m making a space.” She says her paintings have no discernable represented space but there is perceived space, and the space for the viewer to create their own.

When asked about her materials, she says she likes a surface that can stick up for itself. Conflict is interesting, disagreement can be educational and enjoyable; she says she picks her art materials like she chooses her friends. She welcomes the unyielding resistance of honesty.

Another space made by Christian is for her family who she is very proud of. They are/were Rick (her deceased partner), and Rick’s kids who are Ricky, Ian (who died young), Joel, Ricky’s best friend who she says they “adopted the hell out of him,” and four grandchildren: Ayla, Sam, Thea and Skye.

As she talks about them, she says “Its grounding thinking about others, rather than yourself”.

Christian is showing with ceramicist Steve Belz’s bonfire glazed porcelain bottle jars which are exquisitely textured in rich earth tones. The show, Slow Work, runs at Childhood’s End Gallery through July 26, and there is an ‘Artist Conversation with Susan and Friends’ on Saturday, July 11, 2- 3 p.m.

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