4 Susan Powers Quotes

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"Susan Powers" is a self-taught United States/American artist who began painting in 1979, encouraged by a friend and fellow painter who had seen her expressive pencil drawings. Only a year later, her work had been accepted for display by the prestigious Jay Johnson Folk Heritage Gallery in New York City. In 1980, Powers spent a year in England and France developing her craft, before returning to the U.S.

The folk art still lifes of Susan Powers have been compared with the trompe l'oeil works of the well-known 19th–century American academic artist William Harnett. Like Harnett, Powers is fascinated with common everyday objects — books, seashells, bottles, and teapots — and she renders them in a manner so lifelike they ‘fool the eye’ of the viewer, almost leading the viewer to believe that the objects themselves are present on the canvas. The trompe l’oeil technique is uncommon with folk artists: some folk artists cannot produce a photograph–like image.