'Artists can express their ideas in ways that are meaningful to them. And if they're lucky, their ideas are shared and become meaningful to others along the way.'
Brian McClear is originally from Ohio and now lives and works in Connecticut. He forged a successful career as an illustrator, animator, designer and marketing platform developer. His representational paintings are of thoughtfully and purposefully composed found objects, and strong portraits which explore the relationship people have with their own body art.
Where is your current studio? What would be your dream studio?
My studio is on the first floor of our home and connects to the living room by a large sliding pocket door. The room is ideal because I enjoy being close to the family when I paint — I don't have to choose one over the other and I'm more likely to get up and paint if I don't have to go off somewhere for the night. Do you prefer to work in silence or does certain music inspire you?
I always have music playing when I work. My taste is fairly eclectic but more often than not, it's the blues.
Describe a moment you had an epiphany concerning your creative life.
After graduating from the Columbus College of Art and Design, I moved to New England where I worked as a freelance illustrator for 7 years or so and eventually accepted a position with a leading marketing firm in the area. During my 20+ year tenure, the firm grew as did my responsibilities. It's a wonderful organization and I have the great pleasure of working daily with extremely talented people. As the years passed, my painting and creative pursuits outside of the office had fallen by the wayside. I let my day-to-day responsibilities get in the way. I missed getting my hands dirty. I thought I needed large blocks of free time set aside to get anything accomplished. That was an excuse, a rationalization. I eventually came to the realization that it was ridiculous to wait for a "free day". Now I paint when I can, a couple hours at a time. As a result, I get so much more accomplished than I ever have before, simply by taking advantage of small windows of opportunity.
What is your favourite/ least favourite part of the creative process?
I love the spark of an idea. I'm very excited when I'm blocking in a new painting. I work from loose thumbnail sketches and enjoy working things out on the canvas itself. I spend much of my day on a computer and my projects are detail oriented. So, having the freedom to explore and play with relationships when developing a painting is my favorite part of the process. As a student, I hated when something wasn't quite working but it was due. At those times, I would sometimes overwork a canvas in an attempt to beat it into submission. Now, I have the luxury of having several canvases going at the same time. Now, when something isn't quite working and I'm not sure where to take it, I'll set it aside and work on another canvas for awhile. This keeps things fresh for me, and my time in the studio, a gift. Do you have a personal mantra or quote which serves to motivate you?
Don't wait to do something because of the time it will take. The time will pass anyway.
How has your style evolved and what contributed to the changes?
I worry much less about "what" I'm going to paint or "why" I want to paint it — I just have fun painting. At first, deciding what to do first after a long break from painting, was a bit overwhelming. I did quite a few little 3x3 thumbnail sketches and found I really liked playing with how seemingly unrelated objects fit together. It was at this point, I decided to do a series. After years of nothing, without having put a brush to canvas — I decided to do a series (picture big air quotes here). I stretched half a dozen 30" x 30" canvases and started in. Even though I work from life with the object in front of me, I played with proportions, adjusted colors and tweaked relationships to align more with what I found interesting about the thumbnails. Once I was 7 or 8 paintings into the found object series, I began work on another project. A series of portraits of people of all ages and walks of life that have chosen tattoos as their form of self-expression. Simply put, canvases of people who are themselves canvases. Now, I usually have a portrait in the works one easel and a still life or two going on the other. Nature versus nurture- do you believe you have inherited abilities from creative parents, do you have creative siblings? Can you identify environmental factors or influences which led to your choices or directions? It's both.
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