Bill Suttles

Bill Suttles was born in 1930 in the Midwest and went on to become a prominent figure in Atlanta’s mid-century art and advertising scene. After serving honorably in the Korean War, Bill returned to Atlanta in the 1950s, where he helped shape the visual culture of the region.

He earned his degree from the American Academy of Art in Chicago in 1952 and soon after began a career in commercial illustration. During his time at the BDA Advertising Agency, Bill was responsible for much of the hand-rendered illustration work that defined the advertising style of major Atlanta-based companies like Delta Air Lines and Coca-Cola throughout the 1950s and 1960s.

Bill graduated from the American Academy of Art in Chicago. Exposure to the great Impressionist Collection at Chicago’s Art Institute while at school was instrumental. He also credits study of Wolf Kahn, Irwin Greenberg, and Coralie Tweed as inspiration. An artist for over 50 years, his painterly landscapes and figurative works in oil and pastel have been appearing in galleries around the Southeast for five decades. What began as a career in illustration, with commissions from publishers and national corporations such as Coca-Cola, Delta Air Lines and Lockheed has evolved into a full time, happy commitment to doing his own work, for his own reasons, in his own way. His training at the American Academy of Art, Chicago, Illinois, provided a traditional academic education which he always appreciated as a foundation and sought to move beyond, as all artists must, who hope to find a way to say something unique, important to them and possibly to others. Bill is represented in galleries in Georgia (Atlanta, Lake Burton and Blue Ridge) as well as South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee. In 2001 he and his wife Pat retired to the Appalachian foothills of North Georgia – where he finds a visual feast available to him just outside his door....

Over the past seventy years, Bill has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in many galleries, organizations, and institutions—too many to list.