Suzanne Betz credits her upbringing in a military family with unleashing the artist within.
As a child trying to cope with frequent location changes, Suzanne found herself (like many young girls), drawn to the idea of horses as companion spirits.
The horses became subject matter for her youthful, creative expression, and through her intuitive connection with these fantasy steeds, both her love of horses and her own creative journey as an artist began.
She attended Corcoran School of Art (now the Corcoran College of Art & Design) in Washington, D.C., and lived on the East Coast until the dissolution of her marriage, when she discovered Taos.
Her new life allowed her to explore those early flights of imagination with the purchase of her first horse, a retired polo pony. Her new home also enabled her to explore her rich inner life with a spiritual practice that has sustained her since, as well as deepened her experience both as a woman and an artist.
Her ability to detach and pull up stakes, to travel from one location to another (she has long had a home in Hawaii also), is evident in her canvases. The movement and gesture captured, along with surfaces which appear to connect somehow to another parallel world, shimmer with spirit and soul.
Although she paints other subject matter, the equine paintings she has become known for, continue to win the hearts of collectors everywhere.
In her artist’s statement for taoStyle Sponsor, Taos Blue, where three of these works currently hang, she notes:
“My paintings have always hovered between figurations and abstraction, sometimes leaning more one way or the other. I work spontaneously from my subconscious, watching images develop that are playful and enigmatic; figures that appear and disappear beneath veils of color. The act of painting, for me, is spiritual and physical joy, reflecting my own personal inner journey. All of my work is about what happens when we move outside the structure and the known. Images shift, change, obscure and reveal the surprise, humor, mystery and celebration of life.”
For more information on Suzanne Betz and her work, as well as Sue Westbrook’s fabulous gallery, Taos Blue, where many more artists hang and/or are displayed in Melody and Harmony (which are also the titles of two of these equine portraits), please visit Taos Blue’s site linked below this post.
All images ℅ Taos Blue
