ARTIST STATEMENT
Susannah Crolius, M. Div. is a spiritual director, creative practitioner and retreat leader. She is the founder of the art + soul community, which is currently expanding into The Center for Spiritual Imagination.
Susannah’s spiritual and creative life cannot be separated. Artmaking is her spiritual practice and her form of storytelling.
Susannah’s found object altars and shrines mark sacred space where the deepest stories can emerge, offering quiet veneration to the fluid and surprising life of the inner spirit.
Susannah collects old clock cases and unique, well-loved antique/vintage boxes (the more patina the better) where they become containers to hatch a new story. She also gathers eclectic found materials from nature, flea markets, barn finds, and the side of the road which will help tell that story. It could be a story of social injustice, a kind of prayer or intention or question, a gesture of healing, a memory, a calling forth, an invitation, a lament, a celebration. Susannah finds working within the contained space of a box a helpful metaphor for telling stories that want and need to be told. While boxes can create a sense of limitation, they can also hold stories, like a nest, where incubating can safely take place and be tended to.
Susannah's: icons
Susannah has also created several public indoor and outdoor interactive art installations meant to create sacred space and invite engagement on topics ranging from the displacement of refugees, legacy and remembrance, forgiveness and an outdoor grief garden.
Susannah Crolius, M. Div. is a spiritual director, creative practitioner and retreat leader. She is the founder of the art + soul community, which is currently expanding into The Center for Spiritual Imagination.
Susannah’s spiritual and creative life cannot be separated. Artmaking is her spiritual practice and her form of storytelling.
Susannah’s found object altars and shrines mark sacred space where the deepest stories can emerge, offering quiet veneration to the fluid and surprising life of the inner spirit.
Susannah collects old clock cases and unique, well-loved antique/vintage boxes (the more patina the better) where they become containers to hatch a new story. She also gathers eclectic found materials from nature, flea markets, barn finds, and the side of the road which will help tell that story. It could be a story of social injustice, a kind of prayer or intention or question, a gesture of healing, a memory, a calling forth, an invitation, a lament, a celebration. Susannah finds working within the contained space of a box a helpful metaphor for telling stories that want and need to be told. While boxes can create a sense of limitation, they can also hold stories, like a nest, where incubating can safely take place and be tended to.
Susannah's: icons
Susannah has also created several public indoor and outdoor interactive art installations meant to create sacred space and invite engagement on topics ranging from the displacement of refugees, legacy and remembrance, forgiveness and an outdoor grief garden.