"My work begins with the belief that a work of art is a refined and intensified form of experience. I am a book artist working with printmaking, poetry, embroidery, and traditional bookbinding to create handmade artist’s books that explore how stories are carried through material, memory, and time.
"Over the past decade, I have created more than 500 unique hardback books. Through this sustained practice, I have come to see the book not simply as a container for text, but as a physical and conceptual structure capable of holding complex narratives. While my work is grounded in traditional craft, I continue to expand the conventions of book arts by questioning familiar materials and forms.
"In recent years, textiles have become central to my practice. Beginning with a series of books created for the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, I began incorporating vintage and second-life fabrics, alone and in combination with paper, as page and structural material. These textiles bring with them histories of use, labor, and care. Unlike paper, cloth records touch and wear; it carries memory in a visible and tactile way.
"My textile books often combine quilting techniques with embroidery, balancing precision and repetition with experimentation and abstraction. Cultural heritage practices are embedded directly into the construction of the work, operating on technical, intellectual, and spiritual levels.
"I am to create work that invites slow engagement. Meaning unfolds through turning pages, noticing shifts in texture, and experiencing how structure, material, and narrative shape one another over time."
Suzanne Coley
Suzanne Coley is a contemporary artist whose practice spans painting, embroidery, poetry, and bookbinding. Her meticulously crafted books and haunting poetry are held in private collections across Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, and the United States.
With a background in classical literature and philosophy, and a lifelong commitment to making art, Coley approaches the book as a keeper of memory. She believes that to understand a culture, one must move through its stories, and that books remain one of the most intimate and enduring ways to keep those stories alive.
Thank you!