After focusing on family, Suzanne Morgan is making her art the priority this summer.

“It’s my time now. I want to explore the mediums I know but try to explore them differently, and then try to do things that are very hard to do in your basement art studio, like oil painting and spray painting,” Morgan said. “Those are two things you can do at home, but it’s limited.”

As a first-year student in PAFA’s Low-Residency Master of Fine Arts, Morgan has private studio space and access to PAFA’s facilities to create work. The two-and-a-half year program is ideal for students who desire the community, support and rigor of a traditional MFA, but with a more flexible structure to fit their lives and schedules.

The core of the program is three summer terms completed on the PAFA campus. During the fall and spring terms, students are off-site, and supported by a vital online community with virtual studios, critic meetings and courses in art history, contemporary art, theory, writing and professional practices.

Morgan had previously shied away from enrolling in a traditional MFA program because it didn’t fit in with her family life.

“I thought about getting my Master’s but my kids were still young and being a mom was a priority,” she said. To feed her need to create, Morgan took classes at Camden County College and designed sets for her daughters’ drama program.

“I started taking art classes in Camden because that’s what fit in the school day. Coming into Philadelphia for a 6 hour studio class just wouldn’t work for me,” she said. “I took a mosaic mural class and we ended up doing a mosaic mural for Cathedral Kitchen in Camden. It’s a huge mosaic and I was one of the 15 artists who worked on that.”

She also became a visiting artist for her local school district. Morgan said she is inspired and compelled to create wherever she is.

“I did some set design and was the lead scenic artist for 20 productions over 10 years in Medford schools,” Morgan said. “It was whatever I could fit in. My daughters did the drama program so I was there assisting. The first year I made a few signs but then I did all of the set design.”

Now with her daughter’s out of the nest, Morgan can refocus and get back to a lifelong passion.

“Art was something I did in high school and then I really put it behind me. I put it aside like you put away childish things. It was a hobby,” she said. “For my family, art was not something you pursued in college. My father was an attorney and my mother was one of the first women executives in government so you went to college and did something like that.”

But now the mother of two, creative consultant, and former producer for NFL films is coming to PAFA for herself. Morgan said she loves being surrounded by people making art and have first few weeks in the program have already included a studio critique with visiting artist Paul Anthony Smith.

Similar to PAFA’s traditional MFA, the Low-Residency program focuses on independent studio work and is interdisciplinary in nature, welcoming a wide range of approaches to art-making.

“I’d like to play as much as I can while I’m here and do all sorts of things,” she said. “I’m very excited and I’m not exactly sure where I’m going.”