Daydream No. 60: Perseid Meteor Shower | Susan Boardman

Dimensions: 14"W x 12"H x 1.5"D
Watercolor, gouache, pen, and ink on Canvas

Susan Boardman is a fiber artist and storyteller whose work draws deeply from the history and culture of Nantucket. Known for her intricate “embroidered narratives,” she uses needle and thread to bring the island’s past to life, weaving together historical research, personal interpretation, and meticulous craftsmanship.
Boardman has been working with embroidery since childhood. She learned the craft from her mother at the age of five and comes from a long lineage of textile artisans—her great-grandfather was a Swiss embroiderer who immigrated to the United States to practice his trade.

After graduating from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 1968, she began to pursue needlework more seriously as a form of artistic expression. She later earned a master’s degree in education with an emphasis in textile arts from Simmons College and completed advanced study at the American Institute of Textile Arts at Pine Manor College, where she also served on the faculty.

Boardman first visited Nantucket in 1974 to attend a needlework seminar taught by renowned embroiderer Erica Wilson. The island made a lasting impression, and she eventually became a year-round resident in the early 1990s. Immersing herself in the island’s archives and history—particularly through her work with the Nantucket Historical Association—she began developing the embroidered storytelling pieces that would become her signature body of work.

Her “embroidered narratives” often explore the lives of Nantucket women—wives, daughters, and travelers whose stories are preserved in journals, letters, and maritime records. One of her earliest pieces was inspired by the journal of Susan Veeder, who accompanied her husband on a whaling voyage in the mid-nineteenth century. These works can take hundreds of hours to complete and are celebrated for their detailed imagery, historical references, and poetic storytelling.

Over the years, Boardman’s work has evolved to include paintings that continue her exploration of Nantucket’s past and present. Whether through thread or paint, she seeks to capture the spirit of the island—its architecture, its people, and the quiet echoes of lives lived along its cobblestone streets and harbors.

Boardman’s work has been exhibited at the Nantucket Historical Association, the Cahoon Museum of Art, and other institutions devoted to textile and maritime arts. Today she continues to live and work on Nantucket, where the island remains both her subject and her muse.

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