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Showing all 6 results
Sarah Clinton
Sarah Clinton
Nashville,
TN
Medium:
Painting USN parent of an alumnus ‘24
“I like to work from life, whether it is with a live model or setting up my own still life and lighting, or hiking to the right spot outside to paint en plein air,” explains Sarah Clinton. Recent works use a collage of printed fabrics, balancing color and composition with an idea of the still life she wants to paint. Sarah use acrylic for the collage and either acrylic or oil for the painting.
“I’m going through a pattern phase. I think it is because patterns often trigger memories (that looks like my grandmother’s couch, or the wallpaper in my first apartment, etc.) or can be categorized as something that was popular in a certain time frame. A lot of the time, I will fall in love with a fabric, not only because of the beauty of the color or pattern, but because of what the fabric has been used for. It is like the material has a past that it brings with them. It is a puzzle to find the right fit for a patterned background, but when the right subject comes along it is exciting.”
Get to know Sarah better:
Our theme this year is Reduce. Reuse. Recycle. In the creation of your pieces, can you point to any examples where you follow these practices?
Yes, I get all my fabric scraps from my mother, who is a quilter. I get some of my papers and maps from yard sales, or the free book bin at McKay’s, which is great for well-worn pages with delightful fonts (but sometimes questionable content).
If you could be any artist in the world, who would you choose to be?
I love to paint outside, so I would choose to be an artist who was more tolerant of the heat and less appealing to mosquitos.
In terms of your art, where is the most inspirational place you've ever been?
The Musée d’Orsay was the most inspirational place. I visited at thirteen and clearly remember standing in the middle of the gallery simply awe-struck at Renoir’s dance paintings and how they made me feel.
