Winston Wächter Fine Art Seattle is pleased to announce a new solo exhibition of work by painter Susan Dory. As Dory explains, the title for this new body of work, Exotic Mass, is taken from “a term in particle physics, roughly thought to be some form of unknown, exotic subatomic particles not categorizable, within the realm of dark matter.” In relation to her work, Dory uses the term to describe her painting compositions, which are built up of precariously balanced forms that stack and tip onto one another to create large, beautifully composed geometric (exotic) masses.

Susan Dory draws inspiration for her work from a myriad of ideas, subjects and visual information. Color is perhaps the most obvious of these subjects, as she relates to Joseph Albers’s idea that color is relational and that certain colors respond and change when juxtaposed with one another.

The natural landscape and the marking of time continue to be sources of compositional inspiration for Dory.  The forms and movement in her paintings evolve as she explores and studies the topography of the earth.  Geological formations, masses of rocks, the negative space and craggy forms of Gongshi rocks, the amorphous shapes of the desert plant llareta – just a few of the things that inform Dory’s work in abstract ways.  The resulting paintings are concerned with color, balance, weight and an interweaving composition built upon heavily layered paint. These overlapping shapes create a layering effect that consequently serve as a visual document of time. This layering process not only allows viewers to see through one shape and into another, it also creates a distinct, tactile quality to the pristine surfaces of her paintings.

Susan Dory’s work has been collected and exhibited nationally in public and corporate collections including the Tacoma Art Museum, the Art in Embassies Program, Microsoft, Nordstrom and the City of Seattle Arts Collection.