Today we’d like to introduce you to Nicole Clauder.
Hi Nicole, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
I’ve had an interest in art and drawing from a young age. Like many children, I was fidgety and had a difficult time paying attention in class if my hands weren’t occupied; having toys or “distractions” at the desk was not acceptable. So, I would keep my hands busy with a spare sheet of paper and doodle throughout class. Sure, I would often get told to concentrate on my work or look directly at the teacher as they spoke. However, as a polite child and consistent honors student, even my strictest teachers couldn’t complain about the results! As an introvert, I would shy away from speaking roles in group school projects, yet my doodling skills would often land me as the person to craft and lead the final product. It wasn’t long before I found that a brightly decorated and well-designed display got students and teachers excited! I started to realize that Art could make other people happy.
Throughout school, I mostly kept to pencil/pen sketches and traditional art, as taught by the standard Public School Art Class. Deviation from the classics was widely frowned upon. But I was drawn (pardon the pun) to cartoons. I enjoy comics and cartoons and videogames to this day! The bright and bold colors, the movement and emotion these distorted shapes would spell was clear, even for a small child. Unfortunately, these were not considered “serious forms of art”, and wouldn’t be supported in the classroom or any art competitions I wanted to enter as a kid. Instead, I refocused my learning to anatomy, movement and perspective; to learn The Rules so I might better break them later.
After changing majors multiple times, you can imagine my delight when I found a College of Animation program at my University! It taught art across the spectrum–from traditional canvas painting with oil, watercolor and acrylics to 3-D modeling, Photoshop, set design, story-boarding and more. I truly found my calling and took every type of art class my schedule could handle–not easy juggling ROTC, extracurriculars AND a social life when all I wanted to do was live in those studios! This is when I actually began to feel like an artist and seeing how my art affected other people created a feeling I never wanted to let go of.
After graduation, I moved to Austin in the hopes of finding employment with one of the many videogame and commercial art studios. There were several big name, Triple-A studios setting up shop, and with Austin being the Creative Community it is, I felt I’d be right at home. Unfortunately, upon my graduation, we hit a big economic depression that drove many of those companies to fire their artists. This left me in competition with not only my fellow graduates but also seasoned professionals. I applied for years to studios around central Texas with no luck. Eventually, all my technical training had become obsolete and retooling would take time and money I did not have. But in all that, I still had Art.
For many years following, I worked Customer Service and Hospitality, keeping up my sketches and drawings on scrap sheets of printer paper I’d rescue from the recycling bin. From those sketches grew a Webcomic (that is still ongoing), landscape studies, painting drafts and better control over my tools. Just like school, my bosses frowned at the doodles and bright colors strewn about my desk, but they couldn’t argue with my work productivity. Even when I would leave early to participate in pay-to-play Art Shows, drag in my giant canvases, or paint at my desk during lunch, I’ve been fortunate to have encouraging colleagues, as well as supportive parents. My first painting sales and commissions were almost exclusively coworkers and family friends!
With the overwhelming love and support of my family and this community, I now work for myself, running multiple businesses, including Art. My paintings hang in several places around Austin, and I’m able to participate in many shows all around Texas throughout the year! Meeting other art-minded people with their unique styles and passions has had a profound and positive impact on my life and my work. I’ve made so many friends through art, and their imagination inspires me to create in new ways. Getting to share a reflection of that passion in my favorite bright and bold colors keeps me connected.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
I would be surprised to hear if any professional found their path easy. For me, like many artists in a Big City, my primary struggles were to Be Seen, while also keeping a roof over my head. It’s hard to get noticed in such a sea of creativity like Austin. Instead of working in a commercial studio as I had intended out of college, I ended up in Customer Service. I was a people-pleaser and enjoyed making others happy, on the surface it was a natural fit. Years of grind, constant emotional stress and making no headway at any company, much less a studio job, broke me down into a years-long depression. Even painting became difficult and tedious.
One day, I saw an advertisement for a part-time Painting Teacher position, combining two of my passions: Art and Mentorship! Now, I couldn’t fit in that, my current job AND my teaching job into my schedule, something had to give. My bosses knew as well as I that two part-time teaching jobs wouldn’t cover housing and dangled a “promotion” to a same-paying sideways move to another position to keep me there.
Leaving that secure job, with all the perks and benefits, was one of the most difficult decisions I’ve ever made. Knowing I no longer had the safety net of a consistent paycheck and health insurance felt like stepping into an abyss. We could easily lose the house and be out on the street. At one point, I was running three businesses while working three other jobs, still barely able to cover the bills, but it was the happiest I had been in years. Finally, I could choose when, where and how I wanted to make my art, and I felt so free!
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
At this time, my current focus is to find new places to hang and ways to use my art to benefit my community. The first thing almost everyone says when they see my work is “Wow, I love how bright/colorful this is!” I enjoy working in the Big and Bold and stand out with bright swaths of saturated cyan, yellow and magenta. Most of my paintings are pets or landscapes in colorful acrylic, done on canvas, glass or metal, and connect people to the beauty of the world around them.They catch the eye and draw people in, and I will often find people grinning while they study what’s on the walls.
Have you learned any interesting or important lessons due to the Covid-19 Crisis?
During the pandemic, I found myself paying more attention to the news and politics–it was important to be informed on the daily changes that affected the health and safety of my family, even when I couldn’t be with them in person. This shed a glaring light on the wide gaps in support of our social safety net that I had not previously noticed. Sure, I may be a starving artist with my own struggles, but the revelation of failure in providing help to people even less off, or how the worst aspects of COVID disproportionately affected people of color, was both at once a rude awakening and an ongoing battle. I care deeply for the people in my community and have only ever wanted to make it a better place. The 2020 Summer Protests drove me to more activism in my art and the following years spurred the creation of several political pieces including “Dissent”, “Damned if You Do(n’t)” with Mask, and “But Make It Political”, as well as many Pride-themed paintings.
Contact Info:
- Email: nclauderart@gmail.com
- Website: https://www.nclauderart.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/
nclauderart/ - Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/
NClauderArt
