Kim Suttell

Artist Statement

I’m a retired bureaucrat who cannot get away from paper and from seeking sense in disconnects. By using the ephemera of aspirational culture—style magazines, art books, home goods catalogs, real estate inserts—I re-position marketing inputs as a test (or testament?) of what we value. Tears and wrinkles and images that bleed through cheap paper are part of the story reminding us to discern perfect and beautiful and important. I tend toward domestic scenes, adding the tension of truly pursuing a comfortable, well-proportioned living space with disposal, imperfect materials. Not a trained artist, I have always been a quilter and sometime poet. Both these disciplines go into my collages, seen in a patchwork approach, strong color stories and new associations of the familiar.