Susan Ferner Peterson

​

My love of art started as a small child. My Mom would cover the table with smooth white long sheets of paper and jars of brightly colored liquid paint. To this day I still enjoy abandoning my paint brushes for my first loved painting tool "my fingers". The cool pudding like paint felt so wonderful squishing between my fingers and sliding along the smooth paper surface. My first academic art discovery happened in the sixth grade. My teacher gave us oil pastel crayons. What a joyous delight that was painting my first landscape with pastels! I knew from that delightful moment that I was an artist. When I attended Live Oak High School in Morgan Hill, I was given the keys to the art supply closet, the treasured spoils of shinny paint tubes, soft sable brushes, crisp bright sheets of paper. My high school art teacher nurtured and spoiled me! Because I felt the happiest creating in the art classroom, I spent all my free time there. I attended college at San Jose State University where I continued my studies of painting and drawing and received a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts Degree.

​

I have been deeply influenced by my spiritual journey. My exploration lead me to study Qigong Healing and Vedic Astrology.  Spirit Animal Series explores the human psyche's archetypal nature and its ability to change, soar, love, and explore.

​

My current series of work a conversation with myths and symbolism of the human psyche.  It is my hope that my work inspires the human psyche. Joseph Campbell stated that, "Artists are magical helpers. Evoking symbols and motifs that connect us to our deeper selves, they can help us along the heroic journey of our own lives." 

​