In a career spanning more than sixty years, Susan Weil has forged a singular path. At 95 years old, she continues to make incredibly dynamic work that is exemplary of her unique vision.
Installation View, Susan Weil, About Time, Shirley Fiterman Art Center, 2025, New York, NY
She came of age as an artist in the postwar period studying under Josef Albers at Black Mountain College with Ruth Asawa and Robert Rauschenberg.
Susan Weil in her studio, 2022
Central to Weil’s practice is her fascination with expressing time through motion, which she does in a number of ways, including her use of seriality, collage, and kinetic sculptural elements.
Installation View, Susan Weil, JDJ, 2024
Susan Weil
Configuration Blue/Green, 1998
Acrylic on paper
60 x 66 in
Susan Weil
Musical Chairs, 1999
Acrylic, charcoal and
graphite on paper
60 x 64 in
In her Configurations series of collages, the nude female figure is loosely painted on a series of small pieces of paper, collaged together to form a grid. Taken as a whole, these paintings articulate a dynamic sense of fractured movement reminiscent of the 19th century photographer Edweard Muybridge, who is a touchpoint in her practice.
Installation View, When You See Me: Visibility in Contemporary Art/History, Susan Weil, Color Configurations 2 (Red), 2000, The Dallas Museum of Art, 2024, Dallas, TX
She draws inspiration from nature, literature, photography, and her personal history. One can sense the pleasure she finds in everyday life—her delight in experiencing the passing of time as she moves through the world with a great sense of curiosity
Installation View, Susan Weil, About Time, Shirley Fiterman Art Center, 2025, New York, NY
Susan Weil, Aswim, 2018, Acrylic and graphite on maple panels, 30 x 30 x 2 3/8 in
The spray paint on paper works from 1971–the subject of Weil’s first solo institutional exhibition at the University of North Carolina, School of Design, in Raleigh, NC—further abstract the body, breaking it down into fragments. These works articulate the silhouettes of body parts—the curve of a hip or breast, the crook of an elbow—and evoke a sense of corporeal fullness articulated through a minimal use of line and form.
Installation View, Susan Weil, JDJ, 2024
Susan Weil, Untitled,c. 1971, Spray paint on paper, 24 × 18 inches
Susan Weil, Untitled, c. 1971, Spray paint on paper, 24 x 18 in
These spray paint works articulate the silhouettes of body parts—the curve of a hip or breast, the crook of an elbow—and evoke a sense of corporeal fullness articulated through a minimal use of line and form.
Susan Weil, Walking Figure, 1968, Spray paint on Plexiglas sheet in open metal frame, 12 1/8 x 12 x 1 in
Her Soft Folds series of paintings on unstretched canvas are made from simple shapes that are painted on both sides and draped into spatial configurations. This series offers a take on the relationship between flatness and voluminosity.
Installation View, Susan Weil, JDJ, 2024
Susan Weil, Sorrowing (detail), 1985, Acrylic on canvas, 26 1/2 x 14 in
Susan Weil, Sorrowing (detail), 1985, Acrylic on canvas, 26 1/2 x 14 in
Installation View, Susan Weil, JDJ the Ice House, 2022
The fullness of shape found in Three Moons, 1990, is reminiscent of a body as expressed through clothing, like the folds found in the robes of Renaissance paintings, which Weil considers an influence for this series.
Susan Weil
Three Moons, 1990
Acrylic on canvas
37 x 26 in
Susan Weil and José Betancourt
Tears, 2012
Acrylic and cyanotype on canvas
24 x 26 x 5 1/4 in
She's often worked with blueprints, exposing the paper to light and using her body and other objects to make impressions, a technique that she introduced to her then-partner Robert Rauschenberg in 1949 and that she continues to use today.
Susan Weil & Robert Rauschenberg, blueprints in Life magazine, 1951
Susan Weil & Robert Rauschenberg, blueprints in Life magazine, 1951
Literature and poetry are a critical part of her practice and inspire her object-based works as well as her many explorations into the world of language. Over the course of her career, she has created over a dozen artist books, and in 2011 established an imprint, Weil Books, which publishes the work of emerging and established artists, poets and writers.
Susan Weil
Brideship & Gulls, 1991
Edition 15 of 25
Etchings, gold leaf and original watercolors
16 x 16 in
Susan Weil
Giacomo Joyce, 1989
Edition 42 of 50
Etchings and collage
10 x 13 in
The meticulously designed books, many of which unfurl into spectacular forms, pair Weil’s inventive vision with the works of writers such as Joyce, the American writer Gertrude Stein, and the 13th century Persian poet Rumi, among others.
Susan Weil
The Reed, 1989
Edition 36 of 50
Line etchings and mezzotints
6 1/2 x 9 1/2 in
Installation View, Susan Weil, About Time, Shirley Fiterman Art Center, 2025, New York, NY
Susan Weil
b. 1930 New York, NY
Lives & works in New York, NY
Susan Weil CV
Awards & Residencies
1977 Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship
1976 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship
Public Collections
Asheville Art Museum, Asheville, NC
Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, Asheville, NC
Bowdoin College, Special Collections, Brunswick, ME
Brooklyn Museum Library, Brooklyn, NY
Bucknell University, Bertrand Library, Lewisburg, PA
University at Buffalo, The Poetry Collection of the University Libraries, Buffalo, NY
Columbia University, Rare Books & Manuscripts, New York, NY
University of Delaware Library, Newark, DE
Dartmouth College, Rauner Special Collections Library, Hanover, NH
Dieu Donné, Brooklyn, NY
Graphische Sammlung, Munich, Germany
Harvard University, Houghton Library Special Collections, Cambridge, MA
University of Iowa Libraries, Iowa City, IA
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Malibu, CA
The Johnson Collection, Spartanburg, SC
Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C.
Library of Congress, Rare Books and Special Collections Division, Washington, D.C.
Lyrik Kabinett, Munich, Germany
Malmö Konstmuseum, Malmö, Sweden
The Menil Collection, Houston, TX
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI
Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis, MN
University of Minnesota, TC Anderson Library Rare Books, Minneapolis, MN
Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden
Montana Museum of Art and Culture, University of Montana, Missoula, MT
The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
National Academy of Arts and Letters, New York, NY
National Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington, New Zealand
New York Public Library, The Spencer Collection, New York, NY
Portland Art Museum, Portland, OR
Rochester Institute of Technology, Wallace Library, Rochester, NY
Scripps College, Claremont, CA
Smith College, Mortimer Rare Book Collection, Northampton, MA
Stanford University Libraries, Special Collections, Stanford, CA
Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, PA
Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo, OH
Tulsa University, McFarlin Special Collections Library, Tulsa, OK
University of Vermont, Howe Library, Billings Special Collections, Burlington, VT
The Victoria and Albert Museum, London, England
The Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN
Wellesley University, Wellesley, MA
Wanås, Knislinge, Sweden
Yale University Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, New Haven, CT
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