Diesel by Susan La Mont.  This is the picture that stopped me in my tracks as I made my rounds on Opening Night at ArtOMatic 2009.  The lighting, the moodiness, the wagon (I have one), the fuel pump (Husband and I collect photos of old gas stations on our travels), the pool table (we play pool only when we run off to honeymoon in the wonderfully cheesy Poconos of Pennsylvania, and another time we rented a house off season on the Outer Banks of North Carolina specifically because it came with a pool table).  Don't you want to know what he's writing there on his computer?  Don't you want to know where he is?

As it turns out, Susan painted a favorite of mine from last year, Heartland, (below) which took up almost the whole panel.  What intrigues me about this painting are the reflections in the window – I did not catch them the first time I saw it.  But was pulled into it nevertheless until I did notice.  This is the kind of painting you could spend hours getting lost in, listening to the stories it tells!

And somehow, when I was browsing her website, I was not surprised to find birds.  There are three things that I usually respond to in art:  people, words and birds.  And although she is not displaying any in ArtOMatic, there there were in her works Music and Living on Borrowed Time (an awesome

piece!)

Here's Susan in her own words:

1.         How many ArtoMatics have you done?

          This is my second Artomatic. My first one was last year.

 2.      Where can we find you this year?

            I'm on floor or level 2, 03, P-6, whatever that is.[ that would be 2^nd Floor, area 3, Space:  Panel 6]

 3.      How did you choose what to show at ArtOMatic?

          Last year I showed two very large paintings, 'cause I was worried about theft. This year the Artomatic folks provided the nifty security hardware, so I went with smaller paintings that I thought showed my true interest: people in environments. And one large one as a central focal point. Like a large bead in the center of a necklace. 

          In response to my question on how she works, Susan says:  "I work mainly from photos, and sometimes combine images from different sources to make one painting. There are wonderful moments that occur, like in the "Heartland" painting, and one just can't set up on a sidewalk on Broadway and paint these days."

4.        How long have you been making art?

            I've been making art since I could hold a pencil. My mother kept a drawing I made when I was about two years old, of linked ovals, that I drew under the dining room table while my sister was doing her homework. I can't NOT do art. I wrote a doctoral dissertation about how artists find and solve problems, and many of them said that making art was a compulsion for them.

5.       How long does it take you to finish a picture?

            Painting takes me a long, long time because I make mistakes and then after musing on what's wrong I have to go back in and fix them. Sometimes it's the color, or the drawing's a little off, or it needs more contrast. It takes a while to figure out what's wrong. I admire the artists who have a natural ability to capture their vision on canvas right away; I'm not one of those. So some paintings take a year or longer.

6.       What do you do if you hit a slump?

            Hit a slump? What is that? Sorry, does not compute. I've never run out of things to paint.

7.       Who are some of your favorite artists, and what inspiration do you            draw from them?

             Favorite artists: Vermeer. Caravaggio. De la Tour. Winslow Homer. Sargent. Monet. Magritte. De Chirico. Maxfield Parrish. Norman Rockwell. George Tooker.

           I like the qualities of light that many of these artists portray. Light really does it for me— strong and direct, or softly graduated. Content is next; there has to be some intellectual challenge or I'm not there.

8.         Have you had a chance to look around ArtOMatic this year?  Any    instant/returning favorites?

          My husband was sick when we came to opening night, so we only saw three floors, and we took them at a pretty good clip. So I felt overwhelmed, and like it all ran together. When I do my first volunteer stint I hope to see more; I did see some awesome painters.

9.       Where else can we see your work?

            My work can be seen at the Antreasian Gallery in Baltimore; the Applegate Gallery in Vienna, VA;Gallery West in Old Town Alexandria; and on my website (see below for link)         

           I'm looking for gallery representation in DC.

10.     Anything else?

            Susan notes that she shares a love of beading with me, and has a bead website with dichroic beads and cabachons and jewelry.  Susan's  art website is here.        

thought for the day: To become truly immortal, a work of art must escape all human limits:  logic and common sense will only interfere.  But once these barriers are broken, it will enter the realms of childhood visions and dreams.