Susan Cooney

Susan was raised in Kingston, New York, a town situated on the Hudson River. After graduating from the State University of New York at New Paltz in 1991, she moved to Maine to work on the water. She spent five seasons sailing Penobscot Bay, working on various windjammer schooners out of Camden harbor. She then spent time on other tall ships, sailing the coasts of Europe, Africa, and the Caribbean, as well as the U.S. eastern seaboard, but always returning to the coast of Maine. In 2002, Susan and her husband, boat builder Steve Garrand, moved onto their 25 foot wooden sailboat, Kainui, and lived aboard for seven years. Today, she currently lives in a small house they built on land in Belfast, Maine.

Over the past two decades, Susan has concentrated on graphite drawings, and has predominately focused on the coast of Maine. Commenting on her work, she states, “Water has always been at the center of my life. And I am particularly drawn to coastal Maine. I like to study the relationship between water, rock, tree and sky of the coast, and it is a view that I am fortunate to have everyday in my life. I focus on the varied textures, and how they accentuate one another. I also concentrate on the effect of light on these textures and the subtle tonal values that the medium of graphite represents so well. The islands have such a unique, aesthetic quality to them that I try, by using the medium of graphite, to emphasize and highlight that quality on paper.”

Susan continues to explore the coast of Maine. Drawings are made in her fine art studio, which is located on Main Street in Belfast. Prints of all drawings are available and made by Digital Imageworks of Waterville, Maine. These signed, limited edition giclee prints are the same size as the originals. and can be found at her studio and at:

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