AUNT MARY'S BEGONIAS

Aunt Mary's Begonias, 6 x 5 inch ink and colored pencil drawing by George C. Clark   SOLD

We arrived early for a visit to my wife's Aunt Mary on the farm in Delphi, Indiana, and she wasn't home from an errand yet.  While waiting for her I sat on the deck outside her house and drew the flowers in one of her planters.

DOG BEACH, WILMETTE, ILLINOIS

Dog Beach, Wilmette, Illinois, 10 x 14 inch watercolor by George C. Clark   SOLD

Wilmette, one of Chicago's North Shore suburbs, has a beach for dogs in its Gilson Park on a peninsula between Lake Michigan and the channel leading to its harbor.  Masts of sailboats in the harbor are visible in the background at the right.

PAPER DEMON, HONG KONG

Paper Demon, Hong Kong, 12 x 9 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

In 1986 I was working on the first exhibition at Evanston Art Center of my series A Year in the Tropics: Images of Vietnam by George C. Clark.  In that first version of the show I included images from the two 5-day R&Rs I got during my tour, visits to Hong Kong and Singapore.  I showed a few of my photographs and I painted a street scene from Singapore and this drawing of ladies putting the finishing touches on a paper and bamboo demon for a street festival in Hong Kong.  The series or parts of it have been exhibited in various venues since then (including the Thompson Center in Chicago, the Milwaukee Art Museum and the National Veterans Art Museum), but in subsequent exhibitions I didn't include the Hong Kong and Singapore material as being not quite germane to the Vietnam War experience the rest of the art dealt with.

I made the Paper Demon ink drawing on paper that wasn't suitable for watercolor, so I used the silkscreen printmaking process to transfer the drawing onto a couple of sheets of illustration board and hand-colored both of them, producing two similar but not identical paintings.  This enabled me to include the image in an exhibition of travel art at the same time as my A Year in the Tropics show.

         

ECSTATIC ANGELS FROM BERLIN AT JACKSON JUNGE GALLERY

Ecstatic Angels, Nikolaikirche, Berlin, 10 x 13 inch ink drawing by George C. Clark    SOLD

I drew these baroque carved-wood angels in the reconstructed Nikolaikirche in Berlin recently.  It has been selected to be in the exhibition ANGELICIES: A LOOK AT THE MODERN DAY ANGEL at Jackson Junge Gallery, 1389 N. Milwaukee Avenue in Chicago.  The exhibition opens Friday, November 18, 2011, with an artists' reception from 6 to 9pm, and will run through the holidays.

I did the drawing on a single sheet of paper that formed facing pages of a bound sketchbook.  I made a copy print of the open sketchbook, retouched out evidence of the center crease, and signed and photographed the print to make the digital image posted above and at What's New From George C. Clark.  At the gallery I will be showing the original drawing which I have taken out of its binding and am now flattening before I frame it.  I will sign it with the date I drew it instead of the caption "Ecstatic Angels."

Update 10pm November 18:  I just got back from the opening reception and I am happy to report this drawing is sold.

ANOTHER SKETCH FROM THE VILLA-LIEBERMANN IN WANNSEE

Villa-Liebermann am Wannsee, 7 x 10 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

This is another sketch I drew at the Villa-Liebermann, now a museum.  I recently posted a drawing I made in the formal flower garden on the landward side of the house.  This is the opposite side of the building where a big lawn runs down to the Wannsee lake.  There had been a brief shower during the train ride out from Berlin, but by the time I drew this in late morning the weather had turned sunny and pleasant and museum visitors were enjoying coffee and pastries at Cafe Max on the lake-facing terrace of the villa.   

BERLIN CATHEDRAL FROM THE SPREEUFER

Spreeufer, Berlin, 10 x 7 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark    SOLD

 I drew this from a riverside table at the Spreeblick Cafe in the Nikolaiviertel section of Berlin.  This is an old part of the city reconstructed after WW2 devastation by the East Germans in the 1980s.  Some of the buildings were restored where they originally stood, some were moved from other locations, some are new copies of totally destroyed structures, and some are new buildings designed to blend with the old.  When I visited Berlin 20 years ago right after the Wall came down, the Nikolaiviertel struck me as having an artificial Epcot Center quality, maybe because it was such a contrast to the rest of East Berlin which was grey and dingy and still pock-marked with wartime damage and full of ugly new concrete Soviet-style structures.  They are the same buildings and it is only 20 years later, but this time they seemed more natural and lived-in, and the former East Berlin is the most happening part of the city.

I started this drawing while waiting for my lunch, then finished it after the meal, which was very tasty, by the way.  The German restaurants and cafes are very good about not expecting you to leave until you ask for your bill, but I felt guilty occupying a prima riverfront table so I ordered a gooey expensive dessert.  Chocolate sauce and several flavors of ice cream were involved.  I had to do it for my art!

Starting my drawing at the Spreeblick Cafe, Berlin

GARDEN IN WANNSEE

Garden in Wannsee, Germany, 9.5 x 6.5 ink and watercolor by George C. Clark    SOLD

One of the most interesting places I visited on my recent trip to Germany was the house the great painter Max Liebermann built on the shore of the Wannsee outside of Berlin in 1910 and where he worked every summer until his death in 1935.  After decades in private hands, the house has been acquired by the state, restored to its ca. 1912 look, and opened as a museum, the Villa-Liebermann am Wannsee.  It features changing exhibitions (currently a show of Liebermann's on-site art from various northern European beaches), but in the the second-floor room that was Lieberman's studio there is a permanent display of paintings he created in the house or on its beautifully landscaped grounds.  It is rare to see art displayed at the very location it depicts.

JET-LAGGED IN BERLIN

Jet-lagged in Berlin, 9.5 x 6 inch ink drawing by George C. Clark

Just back from two weeks in Germany.  I arrived in Berlin at lunchtime after having slept only a fitful hour and a half on the transatlantic flight.  Had lunch at Savignyplatz and reacquainted myself with the neighborhood before returning to the hotel for a 90 minute nap.  ”Must stay awake until local bedtime,” I told myself, then headed for a Helmut Newton exhibition at the new Museum für Fotografie located in an old imperial court building behind the Bahnhof Zoo.  Fortunately it was Thursday, the day most Berlin museums are open late.  Then I had a late supper and finally crashed at 10pm local time.  What do you do when you find yourself suddenly wide awake in a foreign city at 3 o’clock in the morning?  If you’re me, you go in the bathroom of your Kurfurstendamm hotel room and draw a portrait of yourself reflected in the mirror and the adjustable round magnifying mirror.        

ILLINOIS CENTRAL MOGUL

Illinois Central Mogul, 14 x 10 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

I painted this at the Illinois Railway Museum in Union, Illinois.  The name "mogul" describes a type of steam locomotive based on the number and arrangement of its leading, driving, and trailing wheels.  A mogul is a 2-6-0, meaning it has two leading wheels, six driving wheels, and no trailing wheels.

A HOUSE IN THE INDIANA DUNES

Beach House, Beverly Shores, Indiana, 12 x 16 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    SOLD

I painted this some years ago while attending a party hosted by a fellow Midwest Air Force Artists member in the house at the right of the painting.  I looked for the house on a recent visit to the dunes, but it and its neighbors are no longer there-- casualties apparently of the expansion of the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore.

STONE DECK, MINERAL POINT, WISCONSIN

Stone Deck, Mineral Point, Wisconsin, 10 x 14 inch watercolor by George C. Clark   AVAILABLE

See it now at the Longbranch Gallery, 203 Commerce Street, Mineral Point, Wisconsin.  This is the first of a series of Mineral Point (and vicinity) subjects.

GRAND UNION CANAL, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE

Grand Union Canal, Northamptonshire, 12 x 16 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

I found this scene just up the towpath from Britain's Canal Museum in the town of Stoke Bruerne, Northamptonshire.

MACAW THE KNIFE

Macaw the Knife, 16 x 12 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

I found this macaw in a private zoo in the far western suburbs of Chicago where I was accompanying a college art teacher friend and his class of painting students.  There were antelopes and mountain goats brahma cattle and horses and big cats, but none of them seemed willing to hold still for more than a few minutes at a time.  This bird was in a big cage on a shady porch with a blank wall behind him, and while he did move around some, he always returned to this position watching the other animals out in front of him.

This painting and several others that I have posted here (Kathryn's Irises, Jungfernsteig Bridge in Hamburg, and Marienplatz, Munich, among others) are currently in a a secret four artist exhibition I am in in the lobby of a luxury 300 unit condo building downtown on the Chicago River.  I call it secret because it's not open to the public.  I could show it to you, but I would have to take you there myself and let building security know we are coming.  The show is for  the building's residents and their guests.  I have been in exhibitions there before and I do them because work does sell there, including a painting of mine.  Plus they do a very nice party for the opening, to which the artists can invite a very limited number of guests.

A STILL LIFE IN WOODSTOCK

Kathryn's Irises, Woodstock, Illinois, 14 x 10 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark   SOLD

The Sunday before Memorial Day we drove out to Woodstock to paint in the garden of friends there.  Halfway there the sky opened up and it rained heavily for much of the afternoon.  Our hostess went out with an umbrella and harvested some irises for us to paint indoors.

Work in progress

TRAM IN BASEL, SWITZERLAND

Tram in Basel,  23 x 29 inch oil and pencil on paper painting by George C. Clark   PRINT AVAILABLE

I liked the look of the four-wheeled streetcars they had in Basel, but they wouldn't hold still long enough for me to draw them, so I painted this from my photographs.  The bearded passenger with the hat is a self-portrait.  This painting was accepted at one of the juryings for the Art Rental and Sales Gallery of the Art Institute of Chicago, back in the days when the museum supported and exhibited Chicago artists.  A few months later I was walking down Michigan Avenue and I glanced into the plate glass front of the Michigan Avenue National Bank, and there in the lobby on a big square pillar facing me was Tram in Basel.  The bank kept it for two rental periods, then returned it to the gallery where it was purchased by a private collector.  Unframed 12 x 16 inch prints of this painting are available for $10 at the Museum Store of the Illinois Railway Museum in Union Illinois.

HAMBURG

The Jungfernsteig Bridge in Hamburg, 9 x 12 watercolor by George C. Clark   AVAILABLE

This was painted the same day as Rathaus in Hamburg that I posted earlier.  I think the Rathaus was behind me and to my right as I painted this one.  Earlier I had painted the view of the Rathaus from the bridge you see in this painting.

MILLPOND IN MAASTRICHT

Millpond in Maastricht, Holland,  14 x 10 inch watercolor by George C. Clark   SOLD

A sunny winter morning in the Netherlands, but a little too cold for on-site painting.

TWO RECENT RAILROAD PAINTINGS

Chicago Streetcar Barn, Illinois Railway Museum, 14 x 10 inch watercolor by George C. Clark  AVAILABLE

Last summer, after I had been invited to create a poster and railroad prints for the Illinois Railway Museum in Union, Illinois, I was also invited to come out on a busy weekend in September to paint on site and be an event for museum visitors.  Because the trains are moved around from time to time, I went out there on a sunny day a week ahead with my camera to pick some good painting locations, both indoors and out, September weather being what it is.  The day I came to paint turned out to be really overcast and threatening to rain, so I set up in the corner of the car barn where old Chicago street cars are displayed.  That's a "Green Hornet" streamlined car from the 1940s in the foreground, a 1970s "Skokie Swift" train behind it, and an old car from the 1920s or earlier in the distance.  The overcast light was actually better for painting than it been the week before, when bright sunlight had been coming in the open doors to the left.  I finished the painting on site, then took a break for a late lunch.

Burlington Northern No. 3007, 14 x 12 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark  AVAILABLE

After lunch, although it was still overcast it hadn't actually rained, so I decided to work outdoors.  I liked the front of this locomotive, but it had looked better as a painting subject in sunlight.  I set up in front of it with a folding card table and a stool and spent about an hour and a half doing a fairly tight ink drawing on watercolor board.  The rain held off until the drawing was almost finished and I had to pack up and leave.  At home I used the photographs I had taken in sunlight as a guide when I added my watercolors.

FAST FOOD

Fast Food in the Yorkshire Dales, 14 x 11 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark     SOLD

I found this fish and chips shop in Pately Bridge, a market town in Nidderdale in Yorkshire.  We were on our way to Whitby and had stopped here briefly for a traveling companion to use an ATM, so I did this painting later from photographs.

MARIENPLATZ, MUNICH

Marienplatz, Munich, 9 x 12 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

I painted this sitting on one of those metal chairs the city leaves around for tired shoppers, tourists and artists.

THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR

House in Ravenswood, 16 x 12 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    SOLD

This was the view from my studio window when I lived in an apartment building in the Ravenswood neighborhood on the North Side of Chicago.

ROOFTOPS OF KETTLEWELL

The View From the Skylight, 10 x 13 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

The Rooftops of Kettlewell, 13 x 10 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark    SOLD

When I was taking part in an Earthwatch archaeology project in England, the volunteers stayed at the Youth Hostel in Kettlewell, a charming town in the Yorkshire Dales National Park.  The Youth Hostel occupies a three story 1828 building that is taller than anything in town except the church tower.  My room on the third floor didn't have a window, but if I stood up straight and tilted open the skylight, I could see this view overlooking the 17th century building across the street.  People can own property in Britain's national parks, but they can't tear down historic buildings, and new buildings have to match the style of the old ones.  The only way to tell new from old is that old buildings have external plumbing.
The Rooftops of Kettlewell is the view from the end of the third floor hallway looking over the building next door.

FISHTOWN, LELAND, MICHIGAN

Fishtown, Leland, Michigan, 10 x 14 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

I painted this from the rocks at the mouth of the river that runs through the oldest part of Leland on the Leelanau Peninsula north of Traverse City, Michigan.

TRIER, GERMANY

Ostallee in the Rain, Trier, Germany, 10 x 14 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    SOLD 

I painted this out of the window of a hotel room on a rainy, jet-lagged winter afternoon.  Bad weather can be as interesting to paint as good weather, although you have to find yourself a dry place to observe it from.

MY RAILROAD ART

  

16 x 12 inch Illinois Railway Museum Poster by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

 Trains were some of the first things I drew when I was a little kid.  I had electric trains-- I still have them, actually, as well as the electric trains I inherited from my father.  I have always enjoyed looking at and riding on trains, and over the years as a landscape painter I had done a number of paintings that include some railroad imagery.  Then in the late 1990s an artist friend who was teaching a summer college course in on-site painting invited me to accompany his classes to various sites around Chicago because he knew I enjoyed painting on location.  One of the places we worked was the Illinois Railway Museum in Union, Illinois.  I was quite pleased with the painting I did there, and I thought the museum offered a lot of interesting subjects to paint, so I started going there 2 or 3 times each summer with my watercolors.  My on-site railroad art enabled me to get commissions for large railroad-themed murals in hotels in Cleveland and Pittsburgh.  I gave the series a name: AGE OF IRON: Railroad Art by George C. Clark, and showed paintings from it in various exhibitions, although I have not yet done an exhibition of railroad art exclusively.

When I did an exhibition at the Vanderpoel Art Museum in Chicago in 2010 I reproduced Saddle-tank Switch Engine on both the announcement card and a 16 x 12 inch poster for the show.  I sent a poster to the Railway Museum asking them to post it for their volunteer staff to see, and the manager of the museum store called me and asked me to make a poster for the IRM with the same image for them to sell to the public.  I self-published the poster for them, and then they invited me to show framed prints of some of my railroad art in their ArtCar display space and asked me to let them sell unframed prints in the museum store.  I was happy to oblige, and that's how I became sort of an "official" artist of the Illinois Railway Museum.  I used to paint there on quiet weekday mornings, but now they want me to come on busy weekends and be an "event" for their visitors.  The last time I was there painting I had the honor of having tourists ask me to autograph prints of my art they had just purchased!

Saddle-tank Switch Engine, 14 x 10 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

My original watercolor painting Saddle-tank Switch Engine is currently on display with other examples of my work at the Longbranch Gallery, 203 Commerce Street in Mineral Point, Wisconsin.

KOCHELSEE IN BAVARIA

Kochelsee in the Rain, 12 x 16 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

I painted this in the front passenger seat of a rented Volkswagen Golf pulled off the road at a scenic overlook.  I had the watercolor pad on my lap and my watercolor paints deployed on the open door of the car's glove compartment.  My wife Pat took a nap in the back seat while I worked.  Normally she walks or explores while I paint, but it was raining.

TWO FROM THE GEORGIA COAST

Dune Boardwalks, Tybee Island, Georgia, 10 x 14 inch ink and watercolor by George C, Clark    AVAILABLE

Boardwalks are used to access this beach on an island near Savannah to protect the dunes and their delicate flora from erosion.  I drew this one on-site.

On the Palmetto Coast, Georgia,  12 x 16 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark    SOLD

I did this one later in the studio from my on-site photographs.  When we were there the sun was going down, it was suppertime, we were starving, and there was a shrimp shack nearby with its own shrimp boat docked behind it.

Update December 2012:  This painting now belongs to a private collection in Florida.

FOX VALLEY PANSIES

Fox Valley Pansies, 10 x 8 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

These pansies were growing in a planter on a friend's deck overlooking the Fox River in Algonquin, Illinois.

THE FARM IN DELPHI, INDIANA

The White Fence, Delphi, Indiana, 29 x 23 inch oil and pencil on paper by George C. Clark    SOLD

Another painting of the farm in Delphi.

THE GRAND CANYON

The Grand Canyon from Yavapai Point, 11 x 14 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

I painted this in early December on the South Rim of the Grand Canyon.  It was a beautiful day, but cold.  This is the only painting I have ever done wearing gloves.  The rock formation in the foreground is called "The Battleship."

TWO FROM ALDEBURGH, ENGLAND

Trawler on the Beach, Aldeburgh, 15 x 11 inch ink and watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

Some years ago my friend Lou Taylor (a fellow contributing artist in the U.S. Air Force Art Program) and I were invited to spend a week in England visiting Air Force installations there.  We stayed at the Visiting Officers Quarters on the American base at Mildenhall R.A.F. near Cambridge, and we visited three other bases in southern England.   Artists on these missions are issued orders from the Pentagon and are treated as the civilian equivalent of a full colonel.  Some Air Force trips are tightly packed with scheduled activities that leave little free time for the artists, but often, especially on longer trips, there is some discretionary time built in for the artists to do their own thing.  When that happens I am ready; I do my homework and bring a guidebook and map.  On this occasion, when our escorting officer told us that because of a British holiday we had a free day with the use of her rented car, Lou said he would like to paint some fishing boats if there were any around.  I knew he was going to say that, and I whipped out a Michelin roadmap of East Anglia and pointed out Aldeburgh,  a Victorian/Edwardian seaside resort with an active fishing fleet.  I navigated and our escort drove us there in about an hour.

Aldeburgh is a charming town that has maintained its hundred-year-old look.  It was a sunny October day, too cool for most beach activities but perfect for painting.  There is a high shingle beach, part of it reinforced with a concrete seawall, that protects the town from North Sea storms.  Fishermen haul their trawlers out of the water and winch them up paths of wooden beams like railroad ties to the top of the beach to keep them out of high waves.  I painted Trawler on the Beach on-site and researched three other paintings that I did later in the studio.  House on the Seawall is the only one of those I still have.  The house is located about 200 yards south of where I painted the trawler.

House on the Seawall, Aldeburgh,  36 x 42 inch oil on panel by George C. Clark    SOLD

Although it was late in the season, the famous fish and chips wagon on the beachfront was still open, and we had an excellent lunch.  When the counterman asked if I wanted vinegar on my chips I said yes, thinking I should have them local-style.  Then he asked if I wanted salt.  I said, "I thought you ate them with vinegar instead of salt here."  "Oh, no," he replied, "we use both."  So I did too, and they were delicious.

ENOUGH HISTORY

I have used the previous posts to tell how I came to on-site landscape painting and the steps that led me to the small-acale watercolor format I have been using for the last 30 years.  That done, I am now going to abandon any further attempts at chronology and just present my artwork, some old, some new, some sold, some available for purchase or exhibitions.  They will mostly be landscapes, but you may see the odd flower or animal or artifact from a museum, and I will include some paintings from my AGE OF IRON: Railroad Art by George C. Clark series, most of which are painted on-site at the Illinois Railway Museum in Union, Illinois.  I usually work on 10 x14 or 12 x 16 inch blocks of Arches hot press watercolor paper, but I occasionally use other papers and work larger or smaller.  Most of this work will have been painted on-site, but there are occasions when that is impossible and I have to work from my on-site photographs.  This can happen when the sun is going down, or when I have to be someplace and don't have time to paint, or when stopping to paint would inconvenience my traveling companions.  There are also times when I will do an ink drawing on-site and add color later from memory or photographs.

Backyards, Chicago, 15 x 20 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    AVAILABLE

I painted Backyards, Chicago on a rainy October Sunday from the external stairway that used to lead to the second floor of my house on the Northwest Side of Chicago.  I had to stop painting several times to avoid being rained on.  My neighbors' backyards look a little different now than they did then, but Rick and Rachel's big elm tree is still going strong.

THE TRAVELER'S SKETCHBOOK WATERCOLORS

In 1976 I left my full-time commercial art job and moved to Paris for the New York Studio School summer session painting classes taught by Leland Bell and Elaine deKooning.  My wife and I sublet an apartment on the rue de Longchamps in Passy near the Trocadero, and I spent every weekday painting models in the studio or landscapes at various sites around Paris or visiting the many art museums with our instructors.  It was a great experience and I think I learned more that summer than I had in four years of art school a decade earlier.  When the session was over we planned to spend six weeks touring Europe by train.  I wanted to make more art, but I couldn't see myself lugging my bulky oil painting gear on and off trains, so I sent all that stuff home by boat mail.  Instead I bought a small portfolio with a shoulder strap and filled it with a box of Pelikan dry pan watercolors, a pad of watercolor paper, two small cups to put water in, and a green plastic French detergent bottle to carry a supply of water.  Thus began my "Traveler's Sketchbook" series of small watercolors and drawings.

Rathaus in Hamburg,  9 x 12 inch watercolor by George C. Clark    SOLD

My green French detergent bottle

I have worn out several portfolios and many boxes of watercolor paints, but I am still using that same green detergent bottle.

AN IMPORTANT BREAKTHROUGH

Ca daMula, Murano, 23 x 29 inch oil on paper painting by George C. Clark    SOLD

I had tried painting landscapes from other people's photographs with unsatisfactory results, but I was happy with the paintings I did on-site.  After a while I learned that if I went somewhere and looked at a subject with artist's eyes, deciding where I would paint from, what format of paper or canvas I would use, what elements I would include or not include in my composition, I could then walk around the site and take a series of photographs that would enable me to paint pretty much the same painting in my studio that I would have done on-site, but without having to worry about the wind knocking my easel over.  Ca daMula, Murano was researched in Italy but painted in my Chicago studio with the same high energy and spontaneity I would have brought to a work done on location with the pressure of having to paint fast before the light or weather might change.  Learning to do this was a big breakthrough for me, and it freed me to work in a much more portable medium on the road.

ANOTHER EARLY ON-SITE PAINTING

Steamboat Natchez, New Orleans, 18 x 24 inch oil & pencil on paper painting  by George C. Clark    SOLD

I spent a morning painting this on the bank of the Mississippi.  A couple from California watched me work for a while, then asked if the painting was for sale.  I said it would be, but not until the oil paint had dried and I made some little adjustments in the studio and let the adjustments dry.  I offered to mail them a slide of the finished painting.  I did that and the wife contacted me and bought the painting as a surprise birthday gift for her husband.

THE FIRST LANDSCAPE PAINTING I SOLD

Lobstermen's Dock, Boothbay Harbor, Maine, 20 x 28 inch oil, oil crayon, and pencil painting on paper by George C. Clark  SOLD

When I first started painting landscapes I had to lug my oil painting gear with me and I could only paint on site.  I painted this from the balcony of a hotel built on a pier in Boothbay Harbor.  The Maine coast was everything an artist could want: beautiful, foggy and atmospheric at times, with centuries-old towns.  This was the first landscape painting I sold at the Art Rental and Sales Gallery of the Art Institute of Chicago, back in the days when the museum was still supporting and exhibiting local artists.

ANOTHER EARLY FARM PAINTING

Thirty Thousand Chickens, 29 x 22 inch oil & pencil on paper painting by George C. Clark  SOLD

The day after I painted Hog Pens (see previous post) it rained, so I had my wife's uncle lock me in a long building with 30,000 egg-laying chickens and a cat, where I made this painting.  That many chickens make a hell of a lot of noise.  The cat wouldn't pose for me, so I photographed him and painted him in later.

HOW IT STARTED

In the 1970s I was working as an art director in advertising, and the only fine art I was doing were life drawings at an evening workshop organized by some fellow admen.  My artist friend Marilyn Packer told me that the Art Rental and Sales Gallery of the Art Institute of Chicago was holding its annual jury for new artists and she suggested I enter something.  I submitted three of my figure drawings, and one, an oil and pencil on paper seminude of a young lady, was accepted.  It was a real thrill for a young artist to see my work on the wall of the Art Institute, even if it was in the basement, and it was an even bigger thrill a few weeks later to receive a check because the drawing had sold.  When I told Marilyn what had happened she congratulated me and told me I was very fortunate, because they rarely accept figures and hardly ever nudes, most of their clients being corporate types looking to buy or rent art to decorate their offices.  I realized she was right because my drawing had been one of very few figurative pieces in the gallery and the only one featuring bare skin.
I was eligible now to submit new work three times a year at the gallery, and I wondered if it was wise to tempt fate by continuing to submit art in the genre least likely to be accepted.  After all, my painting idols Lovis Corinth, Egon Schiele, Gustav Klimt, and Paul Hogarth all painted both figures and landscapes.  I could too.

Hog Pens, 28 x 22 inch oil & pencil on paper painting by George C. Clark

Over Labor Day weekend we went to my wife's aunt and uncle's farm in Delphi, Indiana and I brought my painting gear.  I did four on-site paintings, and Hog Pens was the first.  Three of them were eventually accepted at the Art Rental and Sales Gallery.  Hog Pens didn't sell there, but Chicago gallerist Joy Horwich later sold it to a commodities trader whose specialty was pork bellies.