MILLER-HAVENS ART

Born and raised in New Jersey a bus ride away from the New York City art world, Susan Miller-Havens has been a resident of Cambridge, MA for over four decades. She has had two 20 year careers: one in the field of mental health, the other in fine arts. Originally a reconstructive surgical nurse at the Massachusetts General Hospital, she was one of the founders of The Department of Psychiatry at The Cambridge Hospital.

 

While working in a clinic she pursued a degree in studio art from Wellesley College where her honors advisers were the watercolorist Richard Yarde and landscape artist, James Wilson Rayen, both well  represented  artists. Drawn back to psychology she completed her Doctorate in Human Development from Harvard School of Education. After working in adoption reform as an educator she realized once again that she was drawn to expressing in paint what she had come to  understand about human nature .

 

Not primarily a portrait artist, Miller-Havens paintings focus on the subtleties within relationships and the human condition in general. She is known as an artist who invites the viewer into the painting through unexpected use of color, absence of background, and inventive cropping of the images.

 

Her work is part of private collections in  San Diego, Denver, Miami, New York, and Boston. Her commissions  include the official portrait of Mayor Alice Wolf  Hall of Fame basketball coach Patrick J. Riley and Harvard Dean Jerome T. Murphy. Her life size portrait of Cooperstown Hall of Fame catcher Carlton Fisk is in the Permanent Collection of the National Portrait Gallery Washington D. C. as is her Portrait of Pedro J. Martinez.  She is currently working on the series  "Zooming Out”   portraying the isolation and connection experienced by Zoom participants during the pandemic .

 

She is a member of The Harvard Arts in Education Advisory Council, The National Association of Women Artists, Who's Who in American Women, Who's Who In America,  The Harvard Square Business Association The Harvard Square Neighborhood Association and Somerville Concord, Cambridge Artists Associations