Statement
I use my artmaking to interpret contemporary life, our people, creatures, and the environment, often with social or political commentary. My figures are frequently whimsical, playful, and abstracted and distorted in comical ways. I work with an awareness of color, line, and gesture while mostly keeping the surface flat, meaning I use very little modeling or illusion of depth. I pay attention to texture and edges of the piece and the relationship to the frame.
While much of my work is figurative, picturing distorted and often comical images of animals and people, there is ample historical precedence for my work including The Hairy Who, the Chicago Imagists: Jim Nutt, Ed Paschke, Gladys Nilsson; the great Phillip Guston, drawings by Saul Steinberg, and the painted poems of Kenneth Patchen, an early and continuing influence.
Bio
My name is Gabi Clayton. I’m a seventy-one-year-old visual artist, graphic designer and website designer; a publisher, editor, and co-owner of Mud Flat Press. I’m also the Digital Publication Manager of OLY ARTS magazine.
I was the co-publisher of Mississippi Arts & Letters magazine from 1984-1986. In my thirties I majored in drawing and painting for two years and then switched to film and animation. After getting my BA from The Evergreen State College, I got an MA in Counseling Psychology from Saint Martin’s College and worked as a therapist until I retired in 2022.
While working as a counselor I did a lot of graphic design and web design. In 2016 when I was 64 years old, I purchased an iPad tablet and started making artwork for myself again.