Exhibition in Ilkley Library now up :) an artistic review of 2019

Morning all...
I am exhibiting in Ilkley Library until Feb 2nd 2020. Go have a look-see. This exhibition is all about showing what I have been up to artistically in 2019 ...

At first when I was invited to do this I thought.... "Bla bla. 2019 has been a year of just pain and hospital visits...bla bla I haven't got enough to show bla bla".

Well I was wrong. I had to really spend time choosing and cutting... I have actually been incredibly busy painting this year. Not least thanks to Kayla Herbert whose 12 beautiful poems inspired 12 pictures I am very proud of.

Please go and have a good look at my heart. It is hanging in plain view. There's a few poetic lines from me too ... Yes Martin Fuller I followed your advice. Go see if you can see where.
I am also happy to announce that Phoenix the beautiful son of Ruth Kitcher-Paige has approved my display!!!!!

#2019incolours #stopbeingsomoanysuzyQ #colourseverywhere #sussishappyartproject #artbysussilouise #paintinglifeincolour
#Hygge #ilkleylibrary #Ilkley

Ilkley library exhibition Dec 16

From Monday 16. Dec, 12.30 you can see me in artform hanging up my December exhibition in #ilkleylibrary ... Come and say hej and see some of what I've been up to in 2019. The exhibition will be up for a month and I intend to change a few paintings every week... As usual, I will be doing a colouring book for the children and some paintings for every age. Not much nudity tho, honestly, it's too #*"@-$€=°√÷+ cold to even contemplate doing paintings of naked people. Or painting in the nuddy... Not happening. All paintings have been made in full rain gear and woolly sweaters!

Anyways. That's not what I wanted to say really. You know me. I always have a few conversations going on at the same time. This is what I want you to know and maybe think about:

I was not a popular beautiful kid, I was scrawny, white-haired and bespectacled and had I not had my local librarian notice me and take me under her wing I would not be the person I am today. Twice a week I would take my sister's old clankityclink bike with a basket precariously balanced on the handlebars and pitpatpushstomp my way to the third floor of the old archives where it had been decided the children's library should be located. It was in a back alley and the bullies would often hide out there to smoke and pick on anyone they saw... So getting there at the right time was important. Twice a week the Librarian would fill my wicker basket with five or six books and I would choose a few myself too. And twice a week I would read all these books and take them back to report on whether I liked them or not.

I am eternally grateful for all the libraries and librarians in the world and I am horrified that I live in an age so delusional that the people in power think we don't need them anymore. Nothing can replace the sound of a book being closed after finishing. Nothing can take you to worlds so near and far at the same time as the stories we can find for free in books and on CDs in our local libraries ... The people who think so are obviously the ones who have the money and the social networks that means they do not need this. But we do need it. As a community and as civilisations. Society needs the librarians and the libraries.

So why don't you come down soon and help me support our local library? Then you can take out a book and maybe have a look at my #sussishappyartproject ?

#lovebooks
#saveourlibraries
#saveourlibrarians
#ilkley #hygge #artbysussilouise #fightcancerwithfun @actionforhappinessleeds

#cancerawareness #readingisasuperpower

The Things we love - a video poem

I would like to thank everyone who contributed to the poem and to all that follow me. I've just realised that I have more than a thousand followers on Instagram and I am very aware that this is a choice you have made. To follow me. I am very honoured. Listen to how awesome you all are

To watch me reading the poem aloud and showing you the painting, please press link below:
Poem and Art cołlaboration
Video

#gratitude #allthelove #mondaymotivation #sussishappyartproject #artbysussilouise #happyart #poetry #hygge #sussithepoet #spokenword #taknemmelig #taknemmelighed #kærlighed #allthelove #theseathesea #freshlyironedsheets #ababyshead #warmasphalt #art #sibelius #bookstagram #naivism
The Things we Love 
Sussi Louise Smith, Inspired by the community of followers on Instagram)

Butterflies and forest bathing at dawn
Dandelions in the sky
Oceans, puddles, the sea and all things river
Grass covered in morning dew moving like wandering waves too
Friends in all places
Both high and here

Puppies and cooking, but not cooking puppies
Rainbows in chakra style
across waterfalls and tender hearts
all the children asleep but still holding hands 
and my grandchild’s arms around my tired neck

Rainy skies and skies stuck in trees
Masks on masks unmasking
Nature at its grandest and
above all, the sea, the sea, the sea
cliffs and rocks in open spaces
The sun all set to set again

The joy of books and books with books on top
And a perfectly symmetrical sandwich
next to a tall gin and tonic mid afternoon
Waking early and walking into the blue across the moors 
and in the middle of the open roads
music every step Sibelius seducing us in Finlandia, 
nodes gently caressing my soul, then waking me with
Vaughn Williams and a spot of Ella Fitzgerald

Laughter of true belonging mixed with the calm scent of morning coffee
The sweet smell of a baby’s head and 
Sunshine on already warn asphalt
Shaping like the petroglyphs on Ilkley Moor
Long-lasting love, new love, the love, all the love
And lots of mugs of tea
From a thermos, poured on the forest floor
On the edge of the heather

The comfort of friends, the family kind
Sharing the bliss of that open road
Taking us to the sea, the sea, the sea
The soothing sound of a lover’s voice
And the kids out barefoot to get in trouble
They feel the freedom too
Wonder women on peace patrol
Long baths when I am home alone
While Optimus Primes guards the universe
We are all safe now

Silky knitting in my sofa corner 
Big wooly jumpers comforting smoke in the air
Drunk honey bees too tired to swarm
Cuddles on the sofa
Some say puppies are happiness, some say cats
but it is books, we all know it
And the sea, the sea, the sea

A thousand shelves, with thousands of books
Painting all the colours of love, the love, all of the love
Paintbrushes, panes, pens and markers
Blank canvases and those with stories to re-tell
Memories and soft dreams
Freshly ironed sheets on my freshly made bed, and me in it
That sense of autumn
The ‘just right’ kind of decay, 
The type that smells of possibilities and hope

Or chocolate
And some even long for the perfectly shaped cacti
Me, I long for you, you by the ocean at sunrise
Cornish rolling hills
Rolling straight into the waves
The dunes the beaches the river beds
Blackberries in my babies’ hands and on their happy faces
more in their bellies than in their basket
That perfect garden bench, in that perfect spot
Looking at the village fair on a sunny day
The circus full of magic
Like new moons and bluebells in early spring
And did I say, the sea, the sea, always the sea

Look below to see some of the wonderful books I am reading at the moment. Yes ... Books. My mind is a hive and I always have at least four on the go. I read too fast to just have one. Why many books at once? Because I always get sad when a good book ends and, I don't know. It prolongs it to have several on the go. I am dead picky though. So if a book is full of typos, boring sentence structures or unimaginative characters it gets chucked (read: given to charity) the best read I am on at the mo is @brenebrown s daring greatly. For so many reasons, but also because as a fellow academic I do love research based discussions and when they are sexily packaged in just the right ratio of glorious language and swear words... I'm sold. That's probably why I really should have married Paul Auster, but that gorgeous Swedish dish @sirihustvedt got born first so 😉

One of the great things about #daringgreatly is that it's nonjudgmental but at the same time doesn't take any BS. You want to get on, get in the arena. Don't judge my sorry arse for putting my pale pain-written face out there if you're not willing to show yourself.
This is me. I am Sus. I write to survive and paint to feel alive. What's your deal? In the spirit of honesty, I also live for the glorious taste of my sweetheart's kisses and the smell of freshly ground coffee at sunrise. & rain on hot asphalt. & newly mowed grass. & chocolate (don't eat sugar at the moment but I remember chocolate like I remember .... Things that will get this post banned from Blogger)

You will also spot two of the incredible motivational speaker and downright inspirational in the arena Scott Berkun's books. I hold them dear. I would have them all but my 'project fiscal abundance' is sort of taking it's time so for now I caress these two beauties. #mindfire is just. .. read it. You'll see.

So anyways swipe and see the beautiful books I am reading. And go get the short story collection #thisparadise by #rubycowling  it is as close to perfect you can get. Perfect is not a word I would use about the female persuasion by #megwolitzer but I would call it a really important and mind-blowing read that is the perfect choice for a feisty book club fight.
You can also see #ifoundmytripe by   #ruthfitzmaurice and that book. Is hands down the best memoir I've read in a decade. Also. As I am #lovingsomeonewithcancer I know what it's like to feel like you're constantly living on borrowed time, I felt seen. Naked even
#booknerd #hygge #booklover #bookstagram #whatiamreading #readtoliveathousandlives

Book launch: Between the Spaces, by KM Herbert illustrated by yours truly

Thank you everyone who came yesterday for the book launch of 'Between the Spaces'. We had a lovely evening with you all and are truly grateful for your support and kind words.
For the rest of you... As you can see some serious academic presenting went on 😋❤ nah. Don't worry. I was trying to explain the intricate connections between the Danish words eventyr and the English fairy tale. In the end it boils down to good fun and wonderful imaginative poetry.
I also went @brenebrown on their arses and said that this collection of poetry is sat squarely in the middle of the Arena, Kayla is showing herself to us and that kind of courage is applaudable. These poems are not like easy pop songs made up of 'all the good nodes' and a catchy chorus... It is a frigging 10 minute Bohemian Rhapsody that will leave you crying in the corner one minute and dancing half naked on the tables the next. Or maybe that is just in Denmark... You can show joy in the English way..I'm not judging 😍.
Point is. This is millennial poetry at its rawest and most hopeful. And the illustrations are poppin'

Go get yours at @thegrovebookshop or order online with me or Kayla. £12.99 plus shipping.

#12poems12illustrations
#betweenthespaces #artbysussi #kaylamherbert #millennialpoetry  #illustrator #booklaunch #poetrycards #sussilouisesmith #grovebookshop #firstpublication #ilovebooks #ilovepoetry #bookworm #eventyr #bigmagic

What am I and what is a stone... and art and everything really!!??!?

Isn't language a funny thing

when is a stone a rock or a rock a pebble?

And when is art art and not a scribbledoodleythingybob?

And when are we ... something

And what am I?

well. the answer to one of these questions is that we are always something. I was looking at instagram profiles and it struck me that a lot of women put: Wife, Mother, **designer** or what ever their profession was. Men would say Photographer, traveler dad of **Josiah**

Mine says 'Danish book lover and  salty licorice eater based in England'

I mean how silly is that?

So what am I really? I am happy. I am blonde. I am extremely fond of meditation and coffee even though sometimes coffee makes meditation tricky. I AM married and I am completely and utterly besotted with my husband... he drives me nuts sometimes but that's part of what I love about him..

I am a mum and a bonus-mum to three kids. Wonderful, creative nutbars the lot of them like their parents. I am someone who have lost a lot to cancer and I am someone who is committed to making life fun and joyful.  I am an academic and an illustrator, an artist and a coach... But is that really what I am? No clue really

I am the sort of person that hears colours and paints music, and I am the sort of person who has a tendency to love .... but most important I am a soul, on a journey and I am so lucky to have beauty and wonderful friends and family around me. and art. and Rocks that might be pebbles that once were stones.

Copenhagen in watercolour

Sometimes I get really homesick. Then I paint planets with Denmark on. And I feel better.