Susan Smolensky

Susan Smolensky, an artist we featured last December, has won Best in Show at the Women Artists of the West 41st National Juried Exhibition in Rockport, Texas. This was not a sporting art exhibition, but Smolensky’s dramatic steeplechase painting evidently captivated the judges.

Coming In for a Landing, oil on canvas panel, 20 x 16

When I look at Susan Smolensky’s oil paintings I hear horses splattering brush, I feel the jocks’ precariousness as they go airborne. Grass flies and a horse grimaces momentarily as it's snagged in the mouth. There’s not a strip horse in the lot, but the artist’s exaggerations add to the dynamics of the instant.