Author Archives: Suzanne Forbes

About Suzanne Forbes

Suzanne Forbes is a traditionally trained figurative artist who makes documentary art of queer culture and Berlin life. She also works in mixed media. She is a former New Yorker who immigrated to Berlin with her third husband and their two cats. Her work is crowdfunded by the support of her Patrons on Patreon; you could help! In previous lives Suzanne was a graffiti artist in downtown NY, a courtroom artist for CBS and CNN, a penciller for DC Comics on Star Trek, and a live-drawing chronicler of Bay Area alternative culture.

My first watercolor in 25 years!

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Aktion drawing party Alte Finanzamt by Suzanne Forbes April 3 2016I bought a watercolor set yesterday.

One of my beloved friend/muse/patrons has pastel hair at present, and I feel like watercolor is really the medium with which to approach this phase of her beauty.

I did maybe two watercolors in all of my art school career, and three after, and i haven’t touched them since. But seeing what Marc Taro Holmes is doing on CitizenSketcher.com has really inspired me, as has working with so many beautiful transparent colored materials in my mixed media work.

DR in neukolln by Suzanne Forbes April 3 2016Today I went to Neukölln to meet up with an amazing artist I met through one of my classes, Keir, then went to an Aktion Drawing Party to meet my artist friend Daria Rhein. Here she is drawing at the event, which was at the Altes FInanzamt art collective.

It was lovely, with a bunch of artists playing around with different materials, dogs and babies on hand, music of course, and two old-school projectors for live psychedelic wall art. As you can see above!

The watercolors felt easy and comfortable to use until I abruptly relearned how important it is to have a lot of water to keep your brush clean and the colors from getting muddy. The cup of tea I was using wasn’t making it, so I switched back to ink to draw Daria. But it was a fun experiment well out of my comfort zone.

On the way back I was so relaxed and loose I could see the big forms and shapes that make up a scene really clearly, and they seemed so beautiful to me. So I made this super-fast sketch of the people on the U-Bahn. It pleases me greatly although it’s quite obvious I don’t understand how bicycles work.
Sunday U7 Suzanne Forbes 2016

Berlin is basically artist heaven.

Horrible creature attacks in the night!

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bad little cat drawing Suzanne Forbes 2016 CUWe have a bad little cat.

Morgan, our smart cat, is ravishingly sleek and pretty, and frighteningly bright. She controls our entire household. She regards its members as “Daddy” (highly valued and fun to torment), “Not-Daddy” ( a useful servant), and “The Pet Thing She Beats On and Sometimes Washes” (luckily Viviane is covered in luxuriant fluffy fur, which protects her from much of the daily abuse.)

Recently, the bad cat has developed a habit of climbing up from my lap (her sleeping place from two to five a.m.) and biting my arm in the same kind of neat, not-quite-breaking-the-skin, dainty but not pleasant bites she uses to indicate dissatisfaction with petting method. She bites in a row, little bites, until I wake up, go to throw this attacker off me, realize that it’s Morgan and she’s honoring me with her attention, and attempt to return to sleep while being bitten.bad little cat Suzanne Forbes 2016 CU

morganbitesShe also uses this method to neatly, row by row, shred boxes and documents (see picture). The things we do, and put up with, for love.

You can see D is smiling in his sleep because he’s not the one she’s bothering. “Do it to Julia Suzanne! Do it to Suzanne!”

We tolerate Morgan’s abuse because our household practices the religion of Cat Non-Disturber.

I lived for two years in a Cat Disturber household, where if a cat got on your lap right when you were going to get up you just casually removed the cat from your lap. Well, not my lap, of course, but the Disturbers’ laps. Every time I saw them do it I felt like the universe was going to crack apart and explode.

Of course, our house also practises “Cat Scooper-Upper“; one of my beloved friend-muse-patrons has a Consent-Based Cat Interaction household, where scooping a kitty up into your arms is heresy. We all choose our own way to worship; not judging anybody else’s. Just trying to get along with Herself, day to day. What’s your Cat Religion?