Susanne Clawson

Sun Rising
mixed media
13 x 42 x 2 in.

I work almost exclusively in paper. I also make handmade paper. I love color and texture.

I have switched to using commercially made papers because they allow me to use watercolors and other paints to play with. Thus, when people ask me what kind of work I do, it’s very hard to describe, because I do paint and I do use paper. But my work is not traditional, and it isn’t flat.

When making paper, one cannot help but become aware of how important water is to paper — from growing the plants from which paper is made to the very process of making paper. Because of this, the very essence of paper speaks for me of the entire planet. Water constitutes approximately 67% of our bodies, and the planet’s surface is covered by about 70% water. We are a water people living on a water planet.

© Susanne Clawson