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The physical environments in Susan Rios' work emanate
life-affirming values that appeal directly to our hearts and
minds, giving them the power to set us dreaming. Her barely
perceptible brush work, contemporary hues and delicate
detail bring to life intensely introspective paintings which
reveal a strong bond between the artist and her audience.  Her blend of illustrative realism and impressionism
allows her to portray the scenes, objects and moods which
are meant to trigger the imagination of the viewer. She finds inspiration from the
plein air painting and serenity of Claude Monet, the colors of Henri Matisse and
the decorative patterning and precise attention to detail of Gustav Klimt.
Rios' work recalls the paintings of the
seventeenth-century Dutch artist
Vermeer, who similarly delighted in depicting richly patterned oriental rugs,
colorful tablecloths, vivid tiles, and lush drapery.
As with Rios' work today, Vermeer's realistic scenes were thus given an
abstract, architectural edge. Yet with both artists, fascination with pattern never
springs from purely decorative intent; the care and attention lavished on intricate
details invest them with a dramatic and emotional value that enhances the
overall thematic concerns.
The abstract element provided by Rios' use of pattern is complemented by
the shifting perspective evident in much of her work. Planes of space often seem
to shift in a Rios painting; objects within a single scene may be shown from
varying vantage points.
Rios' fluid perspective lends her images a dreamy quality that hints of
surrealism. The scenes depicted in Rios' paintings seem to exist in
glass-bubble worlds where the laws of realism work side by side with the play of
the imagination.
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