“I was one of 11 credentialed teachers teaching fifth- and sixth-graders who came up to the foothills by bus from Sacramento Valley schools,” Matthews said. After earning a teaching credential at San Francisco State University, she took up residence in the Sierra foothills as a teacher for the Sly Park Environmental Education Center in Pollock Pines, a science camp run by the Sacramento County Office of Education. She started out as a biology major at UC Berkeley but finished with a degree in life sciences from California State University, East Bay.

Born in Wisconsin, she spent her formative years in Clayton. Matthews is self-taught artist whose earliest work included drawing studies of natural objects -flora and fauna in her childhood. Painting is a meditative process for her, and when she is fully engaged, three intense hours of studio work can feel as brief as 10 short minutes, she said. When she begins her painting, Matthews works from her own photographs, detailing the subject by drawing it onto watercolor paper before ever dipping her brush into paint or taking a brushstroke. Working from the art studio in her home on Bay Farm Island, she creates vivid and colorful works on paper. When Sue Matthews paints with watercolor, she captures scenes from her immediate environment: boats and watery reflections, lagoons and bay scenes, and portraits of family and friends. The Alameda artist works from photos to detail boats, watery reflections, lagoons, and portraits that she then paints.

Matthew banks watercolor church