Artist Statement

Laura Clark is a painter and printmaker located in Owls Head, Maine. She studied printmaking with Nathan Oliveira in the 70s at Stanford University where she earned a  BA degree in Studio Art, and a BA and MA in English Literature. She also worked briefly at the Academie de la Grande Chaumiere in Paris, and at the Maidenhead School of Art in England before she moved to New York. For over 35 years she managed two careers as a college and private school teacher/administrator and as an artist, but now devotes herself full time to her visual work. She has shown for the past fifteen years in the New York area, once a year for the last ten in a two person show.

Always surrounded by animals and currently living with four dogs, her early series work includes landscape, botanical subjects, and evolving horse, dog, whale, bird and fish imagery. As a young artist she enjoyed success as a painter of unconventional portraits.  Currently she is part of a four year ongoing artist mentorship program attended by an international group of artists, organized and sponsored by Joan Hanley, a much recognized painter in New Hampshire.

Clark believes strongly in the creative energy generated by interdisciplinary and collaborative processes and worked for ten years with Melinda Tepler, an illustrator, printmaker and painter.  They shared a press, studio space and the same hours.  Their conversations and process were integral to Clark’s work; she continues an online, synchronous, intellectual collaboration with Tepler from Maine.

Clark’s second love is art history. She references artists from the past in her work, connecting with them in series she calls “Correspondences.” The first of these was with the deceased photographer Atget in monoprint interpretations of Atget’s photographs of decaying French, private estate gardens, reproducing light effects and composition in the monoprint medium. The second of these was with Ansel Adams, photographer and champion of our National Parks. The gorgeous, silvery light of Adams’ photographs appears in the more mysterious and mystical atmosphere of Clark’s monoprints. This work was shown at Granite Gallery last June.  Her current “correspondence” works with the photographs of Sally Mann, particularly the images from a series entitled Remains.

Clark has particular interest in the fate of our planet and our current tenuous connection with the natural world. Currently, in addition to the monoprint series/correspondences, which are ongoing, Clark is working on watercolor collages of underwater landscapes inhabited by mysterious sea creatures and evolving human forms. These are the subject of her upcoming show in August at Granite Gallery.  She entertains visitors to her Studio in the Woods in Owls Head, Maine by appointment. You can reach her at twowhippetsart@gmail.com to schedule an appointment or purchase work. Her new website is lauraclarkstudio.com where you can see her work, and she also posts more informal images on Instagram at @teatoes2. Clark also teaches individual and small group monoprint sessions by arrangement in her studio; these experiences last about four to five hours and can be arranged by email.