SUSAN BEE
Days of Awe: New Paintings A.I.R. Gallery, 155 Plymouth Street, Brooklyn
March 22–April 20, 2025
Opening reception: Saturday, March 22 from 6–8pm
Talk with Kat Griefen & Catalog Signing: Sun, April 6, 3-5 pm
Artist Statement:
My new exhibition, Days of Awe, centers on several series of paintings from 2023–2025 that translate mythological imagery from a diverse array of sources, examining how visual culture unfolds across centuries and contexts.
Three of these series expand upon my 2023 exhibition, Apocalypses, Fables, and Reveries, by reimagining medieval representations of saints engaged in apocalyptic battle scenes. In the final series, I depict the deities in the frescos I saw during my 2024 trip to Rajasthan, India. These mythical figures––including Kali, Trimurti, Durga, and Ganesha––are placed in composite imaginary landscapes and mixed with playful abstracted imagery. A comparative mythology emerges as visual motifs repeat across canvases, prompting unexpected connections.
The first of the medieval series is inspired by Apocalypse Tapestries from France. Foregrounding conflicts between angels and devils, the tapestries center on the heroic aspects of the confrontation between good and evil. My paintings echo their sources while also addressing contemporary issues such as climate change, displacement, floods, and fire. Also included are three paintings from 2025 based on images from the Siena paintings from the 1300s, which were recently on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
My new works imagine a world of faith and magic where strange and inexplicable events occur. Also included in the exhibition are enchanted symbolic landscapes, such as Pastorale, The Egg and I, and Sunspots.. Here, I turn my attention from cultural mythology to personal mythology: these compositions contain autobiographical elements, including portraits of girls and women at various ages. Blending familiar gestures with the unexpected, my paintings pay homage to our individual and collective pasts while also confronting our present.
Past Solo Exhibitions:
Apocalypses, Fables, and Reveries: New Paintings, 2023 Anywhere Out of the World: New Paintings, 2017-2020, 2020
Pow! New Paintings, 2017
Doomed To Win: Paintings From The Early 1980s, 2014 Recalculating: New Paintings, 2011
Post-Americana: New Paintings, 1998
Past Group Exhibitions: 23°47', 2°27', 2°51', 2021 SYMPOIESIS, 2020 Eleven x Seventeen, 2019 NADA House, 2019 Women On The Line, 2017
Who Cares?, 2017
Razzle Dazzle, 2016
Wish You Were Here, 2016
Unframed, 2015
Wet Paint, 2014 Anomalistic Revolution, 2012 Vestige: Traces of Reality, 2011 New Work by A.I.R. Artists, 1999
Recent Press
Interview : "Lucy Lippard's Life on the Frontlines of Art," Hyperallergic, podcast, YouTube, Nov. 27, 2024
Susan Bee: Artist Talk, PAAM, September 12, 2024: YouTube
"Susan Bee: Eye of the Storm, Selected Works, 1981-2023, ArtSeen, Pat Kearns, October 2024, Brooklyn Rail
"The Viewer and the Viewed in the 'Eye of the Storm,'" Susan Rand Brown, Provincetown Independent, Sept. 4, 2024
"Storms, Lighthouses, and Pinup Girls: Susan Bee in Provincetown," by Antonia Pocock, Provincetown Arts, Vol. 39, 2024/2025: pdf
Isabella Segalovich, “Susan Bee Tames the Beast”, Hyperallergic, April 13, 2023
Valentina Di Liscia, Hakim Bishara and Hrag Vartanian, “15 Art Shows to See in New York This Month”, Hyperallergic, April 10, 2023
Irene Lyla Lee, “Susan Bee: Apocalypses, Fables, and Reveries: New Paintings”, The Brooklyn Rail, April 2023,
Anna Martucci, “Susan Bee Beckons into the Unknown,” Main Street Magazine, 2023
Susan Bee, Studio tour, Brooklyn Rail, Weekend Journal #174, Feb. 8, 2022
Susan Bee and Johanna Drucker, Off-World Fairy Tales (Litmus Press), 2020.
Yinka Elujoba, “Susan Bee: Anywhere Out of the World: New Paintings, 2017-2020,” The Brooklyn Rail, 2020
Barbara Montefalcone, “N’importe où hors du monde: Susan Bee in Paris,” interview, Miranda 21, 2020.
Post Hoc, An Online Art Show, 2020
Deep Color: Podcast Interview #63: Susan Bee with Joseph Hart, 2020
One Question, One Answer, 2020
Anywhere Out of the World: Chagall and me, 2020
SUSAN BEE with Phong H. Bui, The Brooklyn Rail, 2020
Instagram Interview with Phong Bui, 2020
Brooklyn Rail Tour of Susan Bee’s Studio, 2020
Son[i]a #308 Susan Bee | RWM Ràdio Web MACBA + Deleted Scenes
Susan Bee: Creativity in Isolation, Beinecke Library, Yale University (July 7, 2020)
Tangled Tango: A Personal History, AM Journal, 2019