about suzanne sunshine
Suzanne is an artist driven by her experience in commercial and residential real estate and her passion for philanthropy and social activism. Suzanne's life has had three major focuses:
Art, as a painter, an art historian, and an assistant art curator for a major corporation.
Nonprofits, by community organizing public-private partnerships to build retail in inner cities, and funding/promoting brain science collaboration and research.
Social Entrepreneurship, as founder of the social impact commercial real estate firm, S. Sunshine & Associates LLC, which is a leader in advising nonprofits in their real estate and giving back philanthropically, and as a residential and commercial realtor at Compass.
While pursuing an undergraduate degree in International Relations at Brown University, Suzanne researched and wrote catalogue entries for the art exhibition at the Bell Gallery at Brown and The Parrish Art Museum in Southampton, Long Island called “Flying Tigers: Abstract Expressionist Painting and Sculpture in New York 1939-1946.”
Suzanne was the recipient of a Rhode Island Committee of the Humanities grant in 1985 that was utilized to produce a short documentary film about the Abstract Expressionists and the origins of their painting and sculpture in New York City during WWII. After graduation, Suzanne became Assistant Art Curator of Equitable Life to develop the art program at the mixed-use skyscraper Equitable Center at 787 Seventh Avenue in Manhattan. The curators commissioned artwork and coordinated the collaboration between architects, designers, and the artists Roy Lichtenstein, Sandro Chia, Sol Lewitt, Barry Flanagan, and Scott Burton. They also opened the Whitney Museum branch there, restored and hung the Thomas Hart Benton mural "American Today" in the new lobby and curated the corporate art collection for Equitable's offices and the restaurant collections of Le Bernadin and Palio at Equitable Center.
Suzanne has a 38-year career in real estate the nonprofit sector, as vice president for The Dana Foundation for brain research, as program officer at LISC to develop supermarket-anchored retail nationally, and as a leading commercial real estate advisor for over 150 nonprofit organizations in arts and culture, education, health, social services and philanthropy. At Columbia Business School, Suzanne researched and published a paper on the economics of building retail in inner cities.
Suzanne joined the Piermont Flywheel Gallery in Piermont, NY in 2022 has been a member of the Art Students League of New York where she has been studying since 1994. Suzanne began her professional career as a painter in 2014 and has had four exhibitions bringing together commerce, philanthropy and art. Suzanne's paintings are in numerous private and nonprofit collections, including a permanent sky-lobby installation at 1560 Broadway.
Suzanne lives in NYC and Piermont, NY with her husband, Bill and they have a daughter and son.
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Contact: Suzanne Sunshine
"My paintings utilize an edge as a starting point - of light, of sound, and of touch - in our daily lives. Moving within and around the edge, my brushstrokes explore the delicate relationship of color and line within the confines of the canvas. Informed by a passion for intelligent risk-taking in both my painting process and daily life, my work conveys deep emotion bounded by awareness."