The Sketchbook Project

here's my sketchbook for The Sketchbook Project.  Beginning to end.  it is ready to go.

Randomarts After Dark

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Originally uploaded by debclarke art

Here's the view when the sun goes down. twinkle, twinkle, little star...i wish i may, i wish i might...bring some folk down next Sunday 3-5 to enjoy the sight!

Randomarts Dec 2010

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Originally uploaded by debclarke art

Took this flash pic before I left the gallery tonight. It is a tight space, jam-packed with work. This is one small section. There is a lot more.

The reception yesterday was a washout. Pelting cold rain and wind. David and I drank some wine and ate a lot of cheese/crackers. My friend Paul Frontiero from www.goodmorninggloucester.com stopped by, took some pictures and David bent his ear for a bit.

Reception Redux next Sunday 3-5.

best,
deb.

Artist on Art

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Originally uploaded by debclarke art

that's artist Deb Clarke's reflection on the Randomarts window in beautiful, quiet , Lexington Ave. downtown Magnolia, MA. the artwork is by Deb Clarke, except the crying seagulls; which is a postcard by artist Kate Somers.

reception Sunday December 12. 5-8ish.
drop in and say hello, share some cheer. (usual artist offerings: wine and cheese)

artist in residence Sunday-Monday 1-5/6/7ish throughout December
for private viewing:  978-652-8273

best,
deb.

Installing the Work

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Originally uploaded by debclarke art

I'm installing artwork at The Randomarts Gallery at 25 Lexington Ave in Magnolia. the work will be up through the end of December. planning a reception for Sunday December 12. I'll be there at 1, but the wine, cheese and cracker event will be 5-7/8ish. If you are in the area, please stop in. The place will be crammed with work from my extensive inventory. maybe some art school goodies. who know. I have started a free box.

best,
deb.

Nude Painters in Gloucester!

checking out search terms that land on my blog.  this one caught my attention:  nude painters in gloucester ma.  roflmao over this one!  haven't seen any nude painters lately, although i often feel naked when i am painting, have not taken my clothes off to paint in the nude.  yet.  maybe soon.  if i can find a warm private studio.  oh.  i have done some nude self portraits, a long time ago.  i'm so naked in them, they embarrass me.  just a few paintings, a drawing or two, with issues connecting the head to the body.

back to nudes.  if someone wants a nude painting, i can do this.  do i want to?  if the price is right.  i will paint whatever you desire. 

best,
deb.

ps:  today i teach little fingers to fold origami.  then i go to the Randomarts Gallery and put wires on my paintings.  re-hang the show.  going for critical mass.  must remember to leave room for peeps (i have a lot of work to share/unload).  there will be a free pile for those that wish to get something for nothing.

Randomarts Show

This is what I accomplished yesterday at Randomarts in Magnolia.  Today I will re-hang and adjust the lights.  the wall space gets smaller and smaller everytime I look at my work.  the backwall has my 'new' work:  the drawings from this past year.  need to get some putty to keep some of the work from 'moving' on the wall.  small detail of my favorite work follows.

4 mixed media 'drawings' with oil and leaf on 5x5" panels.  definitely need sticky putty to keep these from wobbling.  selling all work unframed.  folk can spend as much money or not on frames.  and get the art at a very affordable price.  these panels will be under a hundred.  still working out prices.

best to all,

deb.

Debbie Clarke on Thomas Kinkade

Kinkade

"Charles Dickens on acid."

copyright Clarke 2010 gloucester ma

New Work!

12x16" drawing: chalk, oil, graphite on canvas

copyright debbie clarke 2010

gloucester ma

The standing figure, again.. new work will be exhibited and offered for sale at Randomarts, 25 lexington ave, magnolia ma during the month of December. I will install the work next sunday, monday, tuesday. for additional information about the Randomarts Gallery and studios their link is in the sidebar under other places. if the address is familiar, it is the location of my former art studio 25. my life inventory is in the attic of the gallery (now owned by artist/life friend Katy Somers). I will show new work, old work. There will be free work, cheap work, paper work, mixed media, reverse glass, oils, self portraits, experiments, etc. and some very good high end offerings. look for my big boy fish! he will be in the show. I will be at the gallery 3-7 or so Sunday, Monday, Tuesdays beginning November 21 through December to greet visitors and friends. stop by if you're in the area. light refreshments available.

best,

deb

my visit to The Cape Ann Museum

I received a note from The Cape Ann Museum last week: 

"To Gather Together and Keep these Bonds:  Highlights from the Permanent Collection", includes one of your works.

I knew the museum was showing Bruce Hermann's new works and wanted to see them, so I went to the museum on Saturday afternoon.  Bruce's new works are about his experience living on Walker Creek, a response to time, change, landscape.  The paintings contain lots of gold and silver leaf with oil/alkyd.  Bright, light, blond paintings.  My retinal memory is of no specific work.  The show is dominated by a large standing rear view nude, this I had a negative response to.  What struck me about his work? The gold leaf panels, which I read as breaks, frames for other more 'painterly' works.  I saw the panels of leaf and thought 'he did it', he left the gilded panels 'alone'.  other panels, were sanded, scraped back leaving ghosts.

These panels reminded me of work that I have done over the years.  I had a whole wall of 180 small gilded panels, paintings that I distressed, washed, scraped, sanded, still have some, some are re-worked.  and there were a few years of just placing gild on panels with no further ornamentation.  I enjoyed the reflective panels, thought they were 'pretty good', but never took them seriously.  part of my lack of conviction was that the response from others was 'bland'.  so I moved on.  oh, well.  time, place, sleepy magnolia, who the hell will see and who the hell cares?  movement, change, move on.

Next stop the permanent collection, but before I go there, I had to stop in the drawing gallery.  George Demetrios drawings!  with my favorite drawings of the head for his sculpture that is in the museum's courtyard.  I will go back to look again.  Such a gift to see these drawings after a long time of not seeing any of his drawings. 

Then the permanent collection and on the far wall, directly in front of me, beyond various 'very good' landscapes, still lifes, watercolors, oils,  on the upper right a small drawing that I had to see.  The vibration drew me to it. What is that?  Oh!  Surpirse, it's me!  a small self portrait in reverse glass with aluminum, silver leaf circa 1995.  The work has held up very well.  My immediate response was:  I really thought I was a 'hot shit' artist then.  Lots of confidence in the work, and the drawing is pretty good.  just wish the pink brown hadn't blobbed on one eye.  oh, well.

I write this to let you know that I am very egocentric about my art.  It catches me off guard.  There are many times I go to art shows, museums and find nothing that 'grabs' me, so I visit with my old familiars.  gothic icons, Tintoretto, Cimabue, reliquaries.  I can appreciate what other artists do, what has come before.  and I wonder about this 'yearning' in my gut for the works of other artists to 'speak' to me.  what is it?  It's the vibration, the energy. and the vibration I respond to is in my work, the yearning is for my work, it's what I do.  so I am left with the certainty that the only place this yearning will ever settle, is in my studio, in my process.

Have you ever walked into a room where an art work has so totally caught your attention that you immediately ask "Who did that?  It is fantastic!".  Then your question is answered with "You did!"  "I did?, I don't remember doing it."  but, there's my signature, so I must have.  What a gift, to see my work removed from my ego, just to be re-introduced to myself. 

If you are an artist, may you have this gift from the universe, to be re-introduced to yourself.  Has this happened to you?  are you a bit egocentric in your art?  If not, you should be, it keeps the terrors at bay.

best,
deb.

Paint this too!

2 small drawings from sketchbook.  1x1.5"  with color key:  RV=redviolet, BG=blue green, YG=yellow green, ochre=ochre

re-create any size you want in whatever materials you desire.  if you want to understand my artist thought, and you know you do, do this.  send me the results and i will post them here, along with your pertinent information, link, or not.

paint this too:  concept debbie clarke, gloucester ma november 7, 2010. all rights reserved

Paint this

Key:
B=blue
BV=blue violet
RV=red violet
RO=red orange
YO=yellow orange
YG=yellow green

very small drawings.  the drawing on the left is 1.5"x2.5".  the drawing on the right is 1"x1.5".  the shapes are given to you.  the color key is given.  the values are not.  paint this.  in any size you want. this is how i see.  i want to see how you see.  send me your solutions.

 i'm cleaning out my sketchbooks.  sorting the entries into categories:  time, line drawing, color, self portrait, grocery list, miscellaneous notes, business.  no peeking.  in due time.

in your time, send me your solutions, i will post them here, along with a note about you, link to your blog, etc.


all rights to this concept are reserved, except you own the copyright to the work you execute based on these instructions.  should you choose to exhibit work based on these instructions, the concept acknowledgement to these first published instructions should be acknowledged with this statement:

concept:  debbie clarke, gloucester ma

copyright november 5, 2010

executed by (your name) date, and place. 

Out of Dream Time into Art Time

personal, communal and psychic history are prominent themes in my work.  recent dreams have provided me a framework for the further development of this theme.  the work will be visual, written, spoken, video, whatever and everything i can think of to define a specific family tree.  a tree with a garden that is just the earth beneath it and the sky above it, no more no less, but the volume is vast.  a mandala of sorts... here's the first flush of an outline.

written by me.  all rights reserved, debbie clarke, gloucester ma november 4, 2010

Marilyn

Marilyn and I have been friends since our art school days.  in later life we shared studio space in magnolia.  she is a very powerful draughtman/painter.  she studied at mass art and at the kansas city institute of art.  i drew this small gilded drawing last winter when she visited me.  she told me that she sees her mother in this drawing.  

i offer up this etheral photo as a prayer for the health and healing of my friend and her family as she undergoes treatments for a brain tumor (the same type of tumor ted kennedy had).  

may all be well and may all be well and all is well, say the bells.

deb.

Gloucester, MA - Mayors' Arts Challenge

click 'like' on the video to help Gloucester win a Mass Cultural Council award. The deadline for voting is tomorrow 10/26/10. our mayor's video is one of 16 being considered for an award, and the video is beautiful.

best and thanks for the support,
deb

The Big Fish

This is The Big Fish (a blue faced cichlid we named 'fat boy') that hangs in our long narrow hallway.  The painting is oil with mixed media on linen, painted in 1995.  We had a 35 gallon fish tank.  This Big Boy ate every other fish in the tank, including several crayfish, then grew to an amazing size.  sometimes i think to sell this, several people have 'tried it out' on their wall, for a few years it was displayed at The Bookstore on Main Street in Gloucester.  Now, I say hello to Fat Boy everytime i hang a coat, store a painting, or head to the downstairs laundry.  

best,

deb.

if their mothers only knew

mixed media drawing on canvas

38x42"

copyright 2010 gloucester ma

debbie clarke

i'm drawing, i'm writing, i'm sorting, i'm re-thinking my online activities. i finished this a few weeks ago.  just turned it to the wall and forgot it.  we put it on the living room wall friday night.  i think it works. this drawing started as a painting on the big white canvas on June 19, 2010.  4 months in the works, not counting preparation of the ground and the contemplation of the big white surface.  the intent was to expose young kleptomaniacs, it turned out to be another story about time, place, and intergenerational history.

best and onward

deb.

It's AHHT!

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Originally uploaded by debclarke art

light art! every once in a while my work catches me off guard with an inner certainty that i am on the right path. the sun hit this painting yesterday. that 'light patch' is flattened out in this image. the reality of the reflected light is that it existed in space, sort of like a hologram. damn, if i could paint like that, but i don't know how to...yet.

my good workspace too

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Originally uploaded by debclarke art

just another view this october saturday with a view to some of my constant companions.

best and more,
deb.

my good workspace

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Originally uploaded by debclarke art

saturday october 2, 2010