Artist Profile — Susan Watson Knight
Susan Watson Knight is an Australian artist living and working in Naarm/Melbourne.
Susan studied Arts and Education at La Trobe University in Bundoora and completed a Fine Arts Degree and Honours year at RMIT. Susan taught at Photography Studies College in Melbourne from 2004 until 2012, when she re-located her home and studio to a rural setting on the outskirts of the city.
Susan began presenting her work to a wider audience in 1997 with her first solo show at West Space Gallery. She has exhibited with Dianne Tanzer in Fitzroy, Langford 120 in North Melbourne, Otomys in Abbotsford and the Front Room Gallery in Richmond. Susan’s work was included in the 2002 Melbourne Art Fair, shortlisted for the R&M McGivern Art Prize at Maroondah Gallery in 2006 and the Light Works Acquisitive Exhibition of Photo-Media at MLC, Kew in 2017. In 2019 her work was shortlisted for the National Still Life Art Prize at Coffs Harbour Regional Gallery and the Sculpture Award at Yering Station in Victoria. Her work was selected for the Women Abstract Artist’s Biennial in 2020 and 2022 and the St Kevin’s Omnia Art Prize in Melbourne in 2021 and 2022. Her work was also shortlisted for the Sunshine Coast Art Prize, Caloundra Art Gallery in 2021 and 2022.
Susan’s work has been commissioned by the ISPT Offices in Melbourne, the Sci-tech Library at the University of Sydney, Hub Furniture in Sydney, the Hub General Store in Melbourne and the Mitchelton Winery in Nagambie, Victoria.
Susan Knight’s recent geometric work has evolved from an appreciation of the Amish quilts designed and stitched in the early 1900’s. Knight’s pigment prints, a conflation of painting and photography, pay homage to the ground-breaking compositions and inventive colour palettes applied by the Amish women. Knight has taken a distinctive approach to her processes; through on-going experimentation with painting and digital technologies the artist has managed to eliminate all signs of the brush stroke, creating luscious planes of colour that have a direct and dynamic relationship with the lines and shapes within the compositions.
In many of these prints, the colour relationships are bold and adventurous, at times creating a kinetic result, and in many cases the humble quilting motifs are scaled up to heroic proportions. These works are both uplifting and energizing, inspiring an appreciation of the beauty to be found in the observation of colour, shape and the dynamic influences that one has on the other as witnessed in both art and nature.
“This series of works has developed from an on-going interest in geometric abstraction and continued experimentation with traditional quilting shapes, in particular the hexagon and rhombus. The compositions are initially designed on stretched canvas, painted and then photographed. The implementation of digital technology as part of my practice has provided the mechanism to soften the edges of each painted shape, and eliminate the gestural marks associated with painting. My work is a series of investigations, testing the relationships between colours and shapes and in some instances introducing a kinetic quality to an otherwise flat and static surface. I’m inspired by the chorus of bird songs outside my studio and the brilliant plumage of the Crimson Rosellas and King Parrots, and my work pays homage to the many anonymous quilters from our past.” — Susan Watson Knight
A detailed CV is available on request.
Susan Knight Profile Image by Trevor Mein.