She/Her
https://tessasutton.com
tessa.a.sutton@gmail.com
Drawing/Painting, Mixed Media
Online mentorship

BIO 

I’m a K-12 certified teacher and artist who lives in NYC and teaches at Bronx Science High School. I primarily paint and draw but do collage as a means to open up pathways into drawing and painting. I’ve also done art residences in South Africa and Italy. Lived in the Twin Cities a couple of years. I have an MFA from the California College of the Arts in SF. I went to Grinnell College.

Starting from points of personal experience, my work searches out relationships of time, history and psychological structures focusing on themes of collapse and transition. I play between fact and fiction as they become blurred in the space of history and memory as mythology takes over. Painting reveals these unexpected places as a tangible illusion.
I explore themes of archaeology, personal and collective memory unfolding in the present moment. Lately, I have been trying to intertwine ecological concerns into these subjects.

TEACHING PHILOSOPHY & MENTORSHIP

If you’re interested in talking about teaching and/or interesting and unique ways to generate work non-linearly in painting and drawing, I could be a good person to work with. I work between abstraction and representation and favor process over product. I focus on the strengths of each person while they go through their creative process and suggest artists to look at/read and things to research that may be different than what you might expect, tailored to your personal process.

I really enjoy the conversations that spring up spontaneously while chatting in the studio with people. I think art is exploration and discovery and that’s what keeps it fresh and alive. You have to make things with your hands to think through things with your mind and heart. Unblocking ourselves is part of the process and risking new territory is key to making art, especially at the MFA level. I’m positive yet critical and will push you in a friendly and knowledgeable way.