Workhouse Artist of the Week: Susan Tilt

It’s not just Susan Tilt’s infectious laugh that creates an aura of happiness in her studio. The former Navy wife turned mixed media artist creates colorful fiber and oil paintings full of vibrancy, whimsy - and the Holy Spirit. 

“I’m not the only one to say this, but sometimes I don’t think that I work alone,” said Susan. “You can call it anything you want, but there is something there that is beyond me. There’s a Holy Spirit thing going on. I can get so lost in my work that sometimes I return to it and think ‘I don’t quite remember doing it that way.’ And that’s a wonderful thing.”

Susan’s contemporary liturgical fiber art (also called “textile art”) is mostly commissioned as vestments for local churches. But it didn’t start out that way. Susan married young and raised two children with her Navy husband, Tom.

“I hadn’t finished school,” said Susan. “I chipped away at a studio arts degree for years, and finally finished 13 years ago at Mary Washington. Prior to that I had taken classes in photography, painting and ceramics in all kinds of places—New Orleans, Washington, wherever the Navy took us.

“I commuted to Fredericksburg for school for two and a half years, which was a marvelous time,” said Susan. “The fiber thing came without a plan. Upon graduation, I had done a lot of painting and photography, but when I started keeping my granddaughter—she was a baby—she didn’t mix well with a dark room or oil paintings. I had sewn as a much younger person and I thought, well, I’ll just play around with it. And it just went from there.”

“A couple of things happened,” said Susan as she leaned back against her lime-green and purple quilted pillows. “An priest friend of mine, who is also an artist, commented one day about some work I had done in fiber and said it would make for a wonderful vestment stole for Christmas.”

Susan created a stole for her friend, and has since been commissioned for vestments, banners and altarpieces for St. Christopher’s in Springfield and New York Avenue Presbyterian in Washington, D.C.

“I’ve never advertised anywhere except for my website and the fact that I’m here,” said Susan. "But it’s just taken on a life of its own. I’m not only making vestments for priests, but also clergy. Word just got out.”

A quick glance around Susan’s Workhouse studio shows that she isn’t just moved by liturgical creations. Large oil pieces tell stories of poetic interpretations or inspirations from travel to volunteer work. “I just got back from two weeks in New Orleans,” said Susan. “I taught for a second year at a summer camp at All Souls Episcopal Church in the lower ninth ward. The church didn’t exist before Katrina —it’s in an old Walgreen’s.”

Susan’s eyes lit up as she described her experience. “It’s my mission,” she said. “A friend of mine, Gayle Fendley is a producer for Religion and Ethics on PBS. Gayle travels everywhere for her work—New Orleans is near and dear to her heart. We started talking one day about the city we both love. I said I would love to go there and help the people after Katrina, but not unless I really had a job to do. I wanted something of substance. She called without a whole lot of notice last year and said ‘they need an art teacher down here, can you come?’ and I just said yes, I’ll be there.

“I took lots of supplies—some of the artists here helped me gather up supplies and helped prepare me for it too, which was lovely,” said Susan. “I took my whole show on the road and taught art to almost too many children. It’s a challenge. It was a challenge last year and it was a challenge this year too because there’s not enough help, and it’s a lot of children who haven’t been exposed to things we take for granted.”

The trip to New Orleans inspired Susan to create her Katrina series: “Before”, “Katrina”, and “After”, which she says is still in her head and needs to get out onto canvas. “I do think of that neighborhood a lot,” said Susan. “I think of other neighborhoods and the raw beauty of it, the ups and downs. I think of the children and the art they created while I was there. All of it feeds me.”

Susan's fiber art sells for about $400.00 for her smallest vestments and her most intricate fiber work, a chasuble (the outermost liturgical vestment worn by clergy) start at $600.00. “I try to keep my prices down because churches and clergy don’t have much money,” said Susan of her costs. “But thread has even gone to $5.00 per spool—which is ridiculous, but that’s what it is.”

“My paintings can go anywhere from about $375.00 to $2000.00,” said Susan as she walked over to a recent oil painting titled “Interview with a Pear Tree”. “This is based on a poem by a friend of mine. Her poetry is so esoteric. It’s a lot of whimsy and fun.”

“I consider myself a mixed media artist with oils and fibers,” said Susan. “It addresses two sides of me. Painting is a way to just let loose. “Katrina” addresses something serious, but the way it’s done, you aren’t sure really what it is. And I like that about it. All the fiber work is far more detail oriented. It’s both sides of me. I didn’t know I could be so detail oriented, but I can be. And there’s a pleasure in that too— then after a point I have to paint and whoosh, let loose.”