WALDOBORO — Suzanne Trowbridge Cooney died peacefully in the early morning hours on Thursday, March 20, 2025, at her home in Waldoboro, Maine. Her husband of over 60 years was by her side, having cared for her through various afflictions for the past five years.

It was a time the family knew was coming, but also, a time we wished would never arrive. Numerous books on Emily Dickinson and her poetry filled her bookcase, and the first lines and title of the poem “Because I could not stop for Death, he kindly stopped for me”, would be lines you might hear her say.

Suzanne was born on August 5, 1943, in the small brick building still standing at the Lincoln Hospital- Miles Campus. Lore has it she was the first baby born in that facility. She was the daughter of Eugenie Stearns Carhartt of Damariscotta, and Carroll Trowbridge Cooney, Jr., of Brooklyn, New York, and Waldoboro.

Suzanne graduated from Lincoln Academy in 1961, and went on to study art at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, and then in New York at Columbia University, the Arts Student League, and Brooklyn Museum of Art. She and her husband also spent time abroad at the University of Strasbourg and exploring Europe’s history and many of its famous museums.

In 1975 she returned to Maine with her husband and two little boys. While devoting her time to raising her children, caring for the family, and painting. In one period she taught children at RSU 40's Miller School, often using some of her students as subjects in her paintings. She completed her studies at Vermont College in Montpelier - her thesis was Self-Exploration through Art - and earned a scholarship at the Vermont Studio School in Johnson, Vermont.

Suzanne’s art career spanned nearly 60 years, transitioning through different modernist styles that included realism, abstract, and expressionism. Along with her studies she was mentored by Anne Avaloitis who held classes at the Waldoboro Art Gallery and Farnsworth Art Museum. She worked in oils, acrylics, pastels, watercolors, black and white, chalk, and drawings, with subjects including landscapes, still life, figures, animals, and portraits. In her artist’s statement, she wrote, “I try to invent shapes, rhythmical structures and color conversations which will bring out the poetic rather than the purely literal elements in the subject . . . I strive to combine personal insight and expression with abstraction and real observation. If I can meet these goals and convey a sense that what I create has been freshly arrived at, I might succeed in bringing an unexpected feeling of surprise and renewal to the viewer.”

She exhibited at the Waldoboro Art Gallery and in 2000 became a member of the Downtown Gallery LLC in Washington, Maine, a 12-member group of accomplished women artists. She served on the board and was chair for a time. She exhibited at numerous Maine galleries and was awarded the Best in Show at the 2004 Maine Art Gallery’s 47 th annual Juried exhibition, among other awards. At a 2004 exhibition, art critic Philip Isaacson described her Border painting and the “slide to old age” as “dream-like . . . the borders that we are all asked to cross”.

Suzanne crossed a border. She left behind much too soon the world she cherished, aspiring to illumine the mysteries of the human condition through her art, painting what you feel, and the family she loved. Anyone in her presence felt their worth. She was a force as those who encountered her would often say. She will be greatly missed by her husband and the many who knew her. Her wit, humor, laugh, intuition and just shear sense of things; her political sensibility and advocacy for human rights and justice; her gardens, shrubs, and flowers; her restoration of the antique 1850’s Cape; her patient way of listening, and her decisive judgment that everyone assumed as correct; and most of all, her smile.

Suzanne is survived by her husband, Ron, and children Isaac (Andrea), and Benjamin (Taylor); grandchildren Sierra (Chris), Katheryn, and Max, and a great-grandchild, Arden; sister Judy Gardner (Paul); and brother Leverett Davis, Jr. (Megan).

The family is making plans for a retrospective exhibition sometime in the future.

Please donate funds to MaineHealth Palliative and Hospice Care at Home, Saco; New Hope for Women, Rockland; Planned Parenthood in Maine, or Doctors Without Borders in Washington, DC.

Arrangements are under the care and direction of Hall Funeral Home and Cremation Services. To share a condolence or memory with the Phillips family, or view some of her paintings, visit Suzanne’s Book of Memories at www.hallfuneralhomes.com.