Susan Hall Biography

I was born in Bedford, England, and even when I was a very small child, I would sit for hours with my wax crayons and paper, making marks, making shapes, making patterns. I grew up in a creative family (my father was a sculptor and my mother painted) and was always encouraged in my pursuits; I never felt restricted in what I was doing. Mainly I was having fun.

Eventually I discovered poster paints and started producing large, colourful works. All of that was a long time ago and inbetween then and now I have experimented with many different mediums. I went through a textile painting phase, a silk painting period and worked in pastels for a while.

There were long periods of time when I was busy with family and ‘proper’ work and rarely painted anything for fun. In those days I wrote poetry and short stories instead; creating different worlds with words instead of colour.

A few years later, I taught art at a local school and had a great time and found myself to be a natural teacher. However, I then went off at a tangent and founded a paint your own pottery studio in Bedford which very quickly became successful and a talking point in the town. Sadly, due to personal circumstances, I reluctantly sold the business some six years ago, though it still exists.

The world works in mysterious ways. Due to another change in personal circumstances, about five years or so ago,  I was commissioned to paint a few canvases and I was reminded how important painting is to me. I still love colour and get excited at the prospect of a new, blank canvas just waiting to be brought to life. My work reflects me in many ways – I paint intuitively and from the heart, nearly always choosing the colours first. Inspiration can come from anywhere, at any time; from something I see or something I think of or even from the lighting of stage or television sets. I often get ideas for paintings or colour combinations and shapes just as I’m drifting off to sleep.

I do not attempt or want to simply reproduce what exists already, but prefer to interpret what I see or feel and let my imagination lead the way to create something new. I resist being pigeonholed by what I do in life, or in what I paint. My abstract paintings are borne of my imagination and passion to create. I now work mainly in acrylics, sometimes oils, occasionally both. My aim is to evoke a mood or perhaps prompt a thought that words alone cannot convey.