Born and raised in the rolling hills of northeast Missouri, I prefer to paint on location. Painting on location moves me to paint with spontaneity.

I often explore the landscape's emotion through animated undertones, symbolic color, or masking in. I intuitively tap my graphic design background to interpret and structure each painting's composition. My paint strokes and colors take over, moving my paintings from the concrete toward the abstract. Some part of a given painting may reflect reality, while another part of it may escape into abstraction.

Whenever I go out to paint on location, I do not preconceive what the painting will look like. The wind and surrounding sounds, intensity of light, temperature and humidity—individually and collectively—influence the passionate reality that I observe. The pace of my painting strokes...the color, length and thickness of each stroke...and each stroke's connection to others...all play a role in how the painting will develop. My paintings are as much about the paint as the landscape itself. Some see the paint first and discover the image subsequently, or vice versa.

Painting on location
at Bass Lake, near
the village of Omena,
Leelanau County,
Michigan.
(above)

Bass Lake in autumn—
just off of Putnam Road,
near Omena.
(above)

As a graphic designer and illustrator as well as a painter, I'm interested in
silent language and symbolic memories that take place in one's life.

In addition to teaching at Michigan State University for 10 years (1989–1999), my academic studies include a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1984 from Truman State University, Kirksville, Missouri, and a Master of Fine Arts in 1989 from Kent State University in Kent, Ohio. I reside in Leland, Michigan with my spouse, Johnston M. Mitchell, and our daughters: Helene Claire (4) and Flora June (2).

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© 2006–   Brenda J. Clark  |   P.O. Box 1041  |   Leland, Michigan  |   231.256.9356  |   clarkbb@msu.edu

Paintings may not be reproduced without permission from the artist.