Biography

Susan’s painting journey began in Seattle, WA in 2010, after many successful years as a freelance illustrator. With clients including IBM, Simon & Schuster, Time Life Books, and the Miami Herald, this career was lucrative. But when her desire to make more personal work deepened, she began to carve out creative time in the studio. Her practice evolved into a steady connection to the work she was making. What she discovered in this practice was a world of magic and metaphor in a process that informs her life.

Susan returned to PA in 2014, after 20 years in the Pacific NW. She paints in her studio in Southern Chester County, and shows her work at Art & Light Gallery in Greenville, SC and Museo Gallery in Langley, WA. Susan has coached thousands of artists and in 2023 began offering destination retreats and workshops through ARTfuel Studio.

STATEMENT

Inspired by her experiences; the landscapes, structures, and people around her every day…and the dreams that come at night, Susan Melrath’s work focuses on the stories connected to nearly every house and street corner of her childhood neighborhood. Melrath reminisces, “The houses weren’t particularly beautiful. Some were quite rundown, but each place had an intrinsic character and meaning for my nine-year-old self.” On summer evenings her mother might suggest going for a drive in the country. The possibility of an ice cream stop along the way, had “Susy” in the car pronto. Her mother, a florist, would always bring garden clippers in case they spotted a twisted branch or wildflowers for an arrangement. The white barns and Amish farms dotted the landscape. They’d pass familiar places such as, “Dog-Patch, Pine Grove, and Frog Hollow.” Melrath acknowledges that the people have mostly moved on or passed away since the 60’s, but those memories remain. These paintings are her tribute to those long-lost times and precious places.