Featured Artist Sue Krzyston

Artist Sue Krzyston’s exquisite paintings capture fine details of the Native American artifacts in her still lifes. View  more of her work by visiting her website.

 

 

I have collected beautiful Native American pottery for many years. When I started to paint in 1981, it was these wonderful artifacts that inspired and drew me to use them for the subjects of my compositions.

 

 

Since I am a self-taught oil painter, I have worked hard to develop the layering and glazing techniques that I use to create a three-dimensional quality in my work.

 

 

I try to use light and shadow to emphasize the smoothness and reflective qualities of the pottery, the fuzziness of a blanket, the fibers of a basket and the glistening, amazingly detailed beaded moccasins.

 

 

I strive to capture the nuances and reflections that, on first glance, a viewer of one of my paintings may not see. I seek to show how the artifacts in each composition relate to each other by using light and shadow to lead the eye around my composition.

 

 

There are many layers that go into each painting. Many collectors ask if “I have glued actual beads” onto the canvas. No, there are five to six layers of oil paint that I build up to give that effect, with a highlight and shadow on each individually painted bead.

 

 

To give the pottery a luminous glow, and to enhance the reflective qualities, I use many thin layers  of my medium with a small amount of paint mixed in to add to the shadows and highlights. The baskets begin with an underpainting of color. Then each fiber is painted in layers to show the fibrous texture of the beautifully woven technique of the basket maker.

 

 

My goal, when I began to paint, was to decorate our new home with paintings. The walls were soon filled, so I began exhibiting at local festivals and street fairs. Soon galleries began to approach me to represent my work, so my hobby turned into a full-time career.

 

 

I am now  represented in Sedona, Arizona, and Santa Fe, New Mexico, along with various other gallery and museum shows. My work has been exhibited at women’s expos in Switzerland and China. I have been juried into “Cowgirl Up!” at the Desert Caballeros Western Art Museum in Wickenburg, Arizona, for twelve years. This show is known as the top fifty Western Female Artists working today.

 

 

I was invited to become an Honorary Artist Member of the prestigious western Mountain Oyster Club in Tucson, Arizona. Among other lectures, I was selected to be featured guest speaker for the Tucson Museum of Art, Western Art Patrons.

 

 

I have done a lot of commissioned paintings and enjoy working to compose just the right subjects and compositions for a home or business. One of my most interesting commissions was having the honor to do paintings for the Washington, DC offices for the Arizona senators and congressmen.

 

Artist Sue Krzyston invites you to follow her on Facebook and Instagram.

 

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