Volunteer Spotlight

Meet Susana Esrequis

Susana Esrequis was born in Peyrano, Santa Fe, Argentina and majored in Statistics at the National University of Rosario, Argentina. In 1995 she came to the United States and is now an American citizen. Susana is a celebrated naïve artist. Her paintings have been shown internationally and appear in several books about folk or naïve art. Her work can also be seen on Christmas cards for UNICEF and locally for the Knoxville Opera. She resides in Knoxville with her husband Ramone Leon where she paints from her home studio.

Susana has been a volunteer at Children’s Museum since 1998 teaching art classes, helping with festivals and contributing to the museum’s South American collection. The staff at CMOR also considers her an ambassador for the museum, since she tells people about us everywhere she goes and shares brochures and other information. “I work everyday for the Museum”, she says,” I meet people and say, do you know about Children’s Museum? Then I give them brochures and tell them all about the Museum!” Susana’s love and enthusiasm for children is always evident. Her fun loving nature and joyful approach to art is contagious to the children she teaches. In addition to conducting classes at the museum, she also gives private lessons in her home.

She enthusiastically tells us, “I am so proud of the museum. When I visit museums in other areas of the country and compare them to Children’s Museum, I think we have a great museum!”

Susana is also an active member of the Knoxville Opera Guild and recently won their volunteer “Spirit Award”. She is on the board of Hola, and the American Association of University Women and is a member of the International Community of Primitive Modern Painters – Morges, Switzerland and founding member of the Museum Austral of Naïve Painting, Esquel, Argentina.

Susana first came to volunteer at CMOR in 1997 when Margaret Allard asked her to lend her skills to the creation of the Rainforest Exhibit. Since then, she has worked in many areas and freely gives of her time and talents. Another way Susana has benefited the museum is by arranging for the donation of 38 paintings from the Museum of Primitive Art in Argentina. These can be seen in the hallway leading to the Rainforest. One of these paintings is hers and can be seen on a CMOR T-shirt in the gift shop. She also arranged for the donation of rainforest photographs by Dr. Ricardo M. Madojana (1940-2001) an internationally acclaimed underwater photographer. These photographs now hang in the hallway across from the rainforest.

Our thanks go out to Susana for all the good work and to all of our volunteers for all they do for Children’s Museum!

The Children's Museum welcomes new volunteers to serve in a variety of roles at the museum. Please call contact Volunteer Coordinator Carroll Welch or Museum Director Mary Ann Damos at the museum at 482-1074, if you are interested in more information.