Suzanne Broughel is a multi-disciplinary artist based in New York. In her work, she explores issues of race – particularly the construct of whiteness and its implications towards being a raced individual. She has been a participant at Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Triangle Artists Workshop, The New Museum R&D Seminar, The Art & Law Program and The Aljira Emerge Program. Her fellowships include NYFA, AIR Gallery and the Laundromat Project. She has exhibited at P.S.1/MOMA, Marlborough Gallery, Columbia University, and Longwood Gallery, among other spaces. She received an MFA from Hunter College. Broughel is a member of the tART Feminist Collective and European Dissent NYC White Antiracist Group.
In my work, I explore the construct of race in the United States. Sifting through history, popular culture and autobiography, I look at our present moment’s disconnect between post-racial fantasies and unequal reality. I am interested in the personal as political, so I look at my own body and I look at skin color. Tie dye, mandalas, African and Native American fabric patterns – styles that reference “hippie culture”, “New Age” practices, and cultural appropriation are where form and content meld for me.
My materials are everyday household objects such as bed sheets, bandaids, and self-tanning lotions. Though mass produced commodities, these are items we bring into our homes, put on our skin, sleep on. It is from this personal, intimate voice that the strongest dialogue on race begins, while the connection to global capitalism reminds us that we are part of a bigger picture that is structural.