I spend a lot of time in nature, with plants. They are part of almost every facet of my life: my work, social interests, the things I read, the artwork I make. Even as a child, I was obsessed with greenhouses and gardens. I observed plants and their reactions to their environment, and thought perhaps that I had a better understanding of plants than of people. As I began to make art formally, I delighted in expressing how humans and plants possess tenacious and yielding qualities, they can either wilt or flourish in the face of adversity. I used nature and plants as metaphors for the human experience, and titled mixed media work on paper, “Feeling Dormant,” “Attempting Actuality,” and “This Wall Grows Around Me.”
Over the years, my work became increasingly experimental and temporal. I found that organic materials such as earth, vines, flowers, roots, and seeds, had global associations, and by incorporating these materials in my work I could communicate a universal connection to the environment. My early large-scale sculptural works entitled, “Greenhouse Effect,” “Mental Notes,” and “Losing Touch with Reality,” each made with natural and found materials, yielded to the elements as they moved in the breeze, grew, rotted, and disintegrated.
Presently, my sculptural work and mixed media on paper are on many levels about how all species- plants, animals, and humans consciously and unconsciously respond to their physical environments. My human-scale installations are designed to engage viewers in a very physical way, by creating environments for bodies to consciously or unconsciously react to. My smaller sculptures begin as investigations of natural forms created by living organisms, and end as expressions of new life forms. A curiously camouflaged, papier-mache sculpture appropriately titled “Adapting Algae” drips down a wall in a gallery space, suggesting natural adaptation to an imposed environment. Making connections between human interests and the environment, I layer, stitch, and graft together images, maps, photographs, natural materials, and words in my mixed media works on paper.
Whether I use words, images, or organic materials to convey my thoughts regarding all species and their connection to their environments, nature is my rubric and my compass, inspiration and model, and serves as the grand strategist and engineer with all the answers that continually lures me to its company.
Education
Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomfield Hills, MI MFA, Printmaking
Rosemont College, Rosemont, PA BFA
Awards & Honors
2019 Individual Artist Fellowship Grant, Delaware Division of the Arts and Delaware State Arts Council
2017 National Endowment for the Arts Challenge America Grand to Organizations and Artists
2011 Artist as Entrepreneur Program, New York Foundation for the Arts
2009 Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant Award
2008 Fellowship, The Center For Emerging Visual Artists (CFEVA)
2006 Award for Outstanding Craft Exhibition, Delaware Center for Contemporary Art, Wilmington, DE
1992 Artist Residency/Fellowship, Core Program Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX
1991 Artist Residency/ Fellowship, Core Program Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX
Residencies
2010 Artist in Residence, Digital Stone Project, Mercerville, NJ
Artist in Residence, Wave Hill Artist Residency Program, New York, NY
2006 Artist in Residence, Edward F. Albee Foundation, Montauk, NY
2005 Artist in Residence, I-Park, East Haddam, CT
2003 Artist in Residence, Edward F. Albee Foundation, Montauk, NY
1994 Artist in Residence, Edward F. Albee Foundation, Montauk, NY
1989 Apprentice, Fabric Workshop of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA
Bibliography
2013 Isaacs, J. Susan, Encountering Nature, Catalogue, August 2013
Aarons, Asa, "TriBeCa Workspace Sprouts Eco-Friendly Jobs," NY 1 Living, January 24, 2010
2009 Studio Visit:A juried selection of International Visual Artists Vol. 8, January 2009 p. 11
Marsh, Anna, In Design Issue: Encounters with People Products Projects #37, January 2009 p. 32
Lubowski-Jahn, Alicia, "Launch Green Spaces A Place for Ecopreneurs," Eco-Chick, November 18, 2009
Doan, Abigail, "Recycled Paper Sculptures by Susan Benarcik," Inhabitat, January 17, 2009
Nelson, Stephanie, "Green Artist Spotlight: Susan Benarcik," Natural Home Magazine, February 18, 2009
Tiger, Caroline, "New Salons: Homes are Where the Art Is," The Philadelphia Inquirer, October 17, 2008
Cole, Marissa, "Artist Gives Found Materials A New Form," Wilmington News Journal, June 9, 2005
Donohoe, Victoria, "LIMINAL," The Philadelphia Inquirer, September 20, 1998
Collection
(Permanent Installations and Commissioned Works) First Dibs, New York, NY Paoli Hospital Sculpture Garden, Paoli, PA Museum of Fine Art Print Collection, Houston, TX I-Park Sculpture Park, East Haddam, CT Elisabeth and Michael Kalogris Collection, Devault, PA, New York, NY Edward F. Albee Foundation Collection, New York, NY Private Collection, Fishers Island, FL Printmaking Workshop, New York, NY Archer Huntington Gallery, University of Texas at Austin, TX Franklin Furnace Archive at MOMA, New York, NY Library of Congress, Washington, DC The Sheraton Society Hill Collection, Philadelphia, PA Du Pont CO. Private Collection, Wilmington, DE Madison Art Center, Madison, WI Oregon Art Institute, Portland, OR University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI Print Club of Albany, Albany, NY California State University, Long Beach, CA
Professional Experience
Teaching and Workshops
2017 Jester Art Space, Wilmington, DE
2016-2017 Delaware College Art & Design, Wilmington, DE New Mediums; New Perspectives
Main Line Art Center, Haverford, PA Fiber Metamorphosis
2016 Abington Art Center, Jenkintown, PA
2015 - 2017 Delaware College of Art & Design, Wilmington, DE
Main Line Art Center, Haverford, PA
Highlands Art Garage, Wilmington, DE
General Electric Global Leadership Program, Crontonville, NY
2015 Mt Cuba Center, Hockessin, DE
2014 Delaware Center for Horticulture, Wilmington, DE Eco-Fusion Workshop
2012-2015 General Electric Global Leadership Program, Crotonville, NY Lecture/Workshop
2012 - 2013 K-5 Educator, A Living Library & Think Park at PS 217, Roosevelt Island, NY
2010 Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia, PA Sustainability and the Artist's Practice
Lectures and Talks
2012 Visiting Artist Lecturer, "Surface Design," University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
2010 Graduate Seminar Lecture, "Sustainability + the Artist’s Practice," Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia, PA
CFEVA Artist Lecture Series, "Artists Working In the Environment," Philadelphia, PA
Panel Artist, Wave Hill Winter Workspace Program, Bronx, NY
Exhibitions
Solo
2019 Evidence of Meaning, Adkins Arboretum, Ridgely, MD
2018 NEST; A Collaborative Project, Creative District, Wilmington, DE
The Arden Woods, Buzz Ware Village Center, Arden, DE
2017 Tower Hill School, Wilmington, DE
Blossoms, Old City Publishing, Philadelphia, PA
2016 Mezzanine Gallery, Delaware Division of the Arts, Wilmington, DE
2015 Sculpture, Highlands Art Garage, Wilmington, DE
2012 The Grey Area, New York Design Center, New York, NY
2011 Open Studio Tour, The Random Tea Salon, Philadelphia, PA
Artist Selections, Jen Going Interiors, Westhampton Beach, NY
Photography and Drawing, The Gardener, Berkley, CA
2010 Material Texture, Desiron SoHo, New York, NY
2008 Collected Responses, 125 Maiden Lane, New York, NY
2007 A Peculiar Nature, Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Brooklyn, NY
2006 Watermark, Lyman Allyn Art Museum, New London, CT
2005 Liminal, Delaware Center Contemporary Art, Wilmington, DE
2004 Rethought, Broadway Windows NYU, New York, NY
Somewhere Between, Storage Art Space, New York, NY
2003 Human Conditions, Destinations, New York, NY
Organically Grown, Fiacre & Fleur, Swarthmore, PA
Liminal, Washington Square Windows, New York University, NY
2000 In The Viewing Room, Inman Gallery, Houston, TX
Group
2019 Delaware Division of the Arts, Biggs Museum of Art, Dover, DE Award Winners XIX
Gateways to Nature, Tyler Arboretum, Media, PA
Trees of Life, Old City Jewish Arts Center, Philadelphia, PA
2018 Delaware Museum of Art, Wilmington, DE Juried Craft Exhibition
Sublime Art in Nature, Rehoboth Art League, Rehoboth, DE
Alumni Exhibition, Patricia Nugent Gallery, Rosemont, PA
Grand Opening, West Park Towne Place, Philadelphia, PA