Suzanne Sbarge: Familiars
Mixed Media by Suzanne Sbarge
Suzanne Sbarge brings together LDBA’s paints with collage in mysterious and inventive compositions.
L’Ecole des Beaux Arts (LDBA Studio) in Santa Fe announces a solo exhibition by Suzanne Sbarge, January 16 – April 19, 2026, with an opening reception on Friday, January 16, 4-6pm. Suzanne Sbarge: Familiars features mixed media paintings infused with mystery, glowing light, vibrancy, and humor. Sbarge explores the interconnectivity between humans and the natural world, combining living, extinct, and/or imagined fauna and flora with humans in whimsical and haunting scenes.
Pink mountains, billowing clouds, gradient skies, and distant horizons set the stage for relationships among life forms. In this body of work, animals and plants are not background scenery; their presence points to the more-than-human world of the inner life. Drawing on the language of myth, the artist’s compositions connect everyday reality to dreams and ecology.
Sbarge made these new collage-based paintings at LDBA in her workshops this year, on her recent art residencies in Utah and Mexico, and in her Albuquerque studio. She says, “I created many of these pieces in my workshops at LDBA, and they have a spontaneity to them that feels fresh and loose. I am in a new phase and teaching has invigorated my approach. My work is informed by mutual learning and being in dialogue with other artists.”
The show at LDBA folllows Sbarge’s solo museum exhibition at Ogden Contemporary Arts in Ogden, Utah where she was the 2025 Artist-in-Residence, a major award supported by the National Endowment for the Arts and The Andy Warhol for the Visual Arts, among others.
In an essay about Sbarge’s work, Salt Lake City writer Kelly Carper says, “Suzanne Sbarge’s experimental, collage-based process is guided by intuition and discovery. After moving from the East Coast to New Mexico in 1989, she immersed herself in the region’s vast light and landscape – working as an artist and earning a master’s degree from the University of New Mexico, where she studied post-Jungian approaches to art therapy through imagery and myth. She was initially launched on this path by a high school philosophy class called ‘Myth, Dream, and Ritual.’ This background continues to inform her route in art-making as an exploration of the unconscious... The process-oriented and tangible nature of collage lends itself to happenstance and unexpected deviations from the norm. Sbarge is guided by the pull of her materials and the subconscious exploration that happens through touch and experimentation. Her work, while playful and whimsical in its creation, stems from deep awareness and curiosity about the world around her.”
L’Ecole des Beaux Arts is a multi-faceted art supply store that combines exhibit space with a laboratory for creating handmade watercolor paints with pigments sourced from around the world, select artist supplies from France, Italy, Japan and the US, art books, and specialty work wear. Sbarge describes it as, “a spa for art that’s full of inspiration for creating and learning.”
Visit ldbastudio.com/adultclasses for information about these upcoming collage and painting workshops with Suzanne Sbarge at LDBA: January 31 • February 21 • March 14 • April 11