L. Scooter Morris calls herself a sensory illusionist, and the phrase fits. Her art doesn’t aim to record what the eye plainly sees but rather what the body senses in passing—the fleeting spark between perception and memory. She turns brief encounters into paintings that feel both immediate and enduring, charged with more than surface detail.
At the center of her practice is what she terms “Sculpted Paintings.” These works resist flatness. Layer upon layer of color, texture, and light push forward, as though the canvas itself wants to break free of its frame. Acrylics and mixed media become her tools for building environments that must be felt as much as seen. While her paintings are undeniably beautiful, their beauty is never detached from meaning. Morris uses the medium to raise questions about equity, justice, and the ties that bind us together. For her, form and ethics are inseparable.
Of Our Own Making (2023, Acrylic and Mixed Media, 19”x37”)
This piece arrives with weight. Paint is built in layers, one upon another, until the surface feels dense, like accumulated history. Nothing in it is passive; every stroke pushes forward. Of Our Own Making becomes a meditation on consequence—on what we build through our own decisions and the traces left behind.
Morris uses contrasts to make that point resonate. Smooth areas sit beside rough ridges. Gloss reflects light while matte sections absorb it. This tension feels human—creation set against destruction, growth against erosion. The painting does not declare judgment. Instead, it invites the viewer to recognize the gravity of choices made and futures shaped.
The wide, horizontal format evokes a landscape, though it is no natural scene. It is an environment of our own design, a reminder that human hands shape the world around us. The painting presses a question: if this terrain is of our own making, what will we choose to shape next?