philosophy
Suze Agnes is an environmental artist and author working with ink, botanical colours, paper and words. A wide range of creatures inspire her work, particularly the overlooked and unloved, like insects, fungi and frogs. Her works often engage with the interplay of image and text, including visual narratives, paintings, drawings and poems, and they have been showcased and published in diverse international contexts. Questions about relationships with living beings are central: the ones we already have, and the ones that can come into being through a change of perspective.
the plant nursery and garden
Plants are key to Suze’s work — a meeting ground for insects and colours. They are her art materials and engagement with local biodiversity in Central Brittany, France. She mainly grows and forages plants, and her garden hosts flowers and wildflowers, herbs and dye plants. Each plant is carefully chosen to support pollinators and other life forms, humans included. This effort has given rise to her micro plant nursery Fleur de Brume. The nursery proposes certified organic plants: available locally to the public, they are a guide for creating pollinator-friendly gardens in France and Europe (Find her plants here).
bringing creaturely worlds into being
Branches, leaves, flowers, oak galls: they become inks and pigments in Suze’s garage laboratory. Her colour-making process uses limited ingredients, including salt, iron, and soda ash. The botanical colours are alive and moving, interacting with light, time and textures of paper, speaking of ephemeral and quietly transitioning life qualities to treasure.
With plants and insects as partners, Suze brings creaturely worlds into being, inviting in their mystery and liveliness. She invites a closer looks at the stories hidden in plain sight: insects dream landscapes, frogs and insect eggs and ponds, mushrooms in a compost pile, lichens on a branch. Her works spark a tender form of noticing — of how everything is alive, and how the delicacy and uncertainties of our interconnected world can be approached with a playful eye.
a playful self-portrait (self as orchestra with creatures)
I am a tumbleweed, blowing around and picking up bits and pieces encountered on my way. I swim in aquatic melodies, sings with insects, grow flowers, and creatures have been pouring out of me for some time now. My work is paper-based, and explores images and words in various forms: zines, comics and other forms of visual narratives, illustrations, paintings, and poetry. These have been showcased in diverse places, including zine & comics festivals, galleries, museums, journals, and online platforms - first in New Zealand, then internationally. The central theme in my work is the relationship between humans and nature. I like to venture to the barely imaginable, to where things become clouded, and hold them for a while — give them a spin.
I am interested in the joys, dreams and difficulties of sharing spaces with other creatures. Different knowledges colour my perceptions: folklore, ancient narratives, contemporary ecological knowledges, and sensory experiences fuel the imagination. A mix of curiosity and endless not-knowing leads me to playful views on the place of humans interwoven with all the other creatures.
Nature is not a backdrop to human life. There is a place for laughter and awe amidst the disgust. There is growth with the rot. A spark of imagination through an unexpected encounter. Small creatures are a lot more intelligent, sensitive, and flexible than usually given credit for. Entangled and often strange, we must keep finding arrangements for living together. Mixing play and the serious, I wish to contribute to a broader recognition of creatures in all shapes and sizes, not just for their ecological importance, but also as lively, aware, full of story, and for whom things matter.