#65 - Clare Bollnow

Clare Bollnow is a 26 year old artist living and working in Chicago. She started painting in 2019, never having gone to art school, she began with watercolor and eventually branched out; she works with oil paint, spray paint, watercolor and pigment dye among other mediums together on large-scale material. Clare finds inspiration in the human form and its expressions, using vivid color and a unique drawing style to evoke emotional experiences for those who sit with her work. These emotions are channeled from Clare’s own reactions to life and the state of the world- communicated through familiar content which allows for a commonly understood visual language between artist and viewer. She is drawn to minutiae, moments often missed, familiar sensations that go unexpressed (and often suppressed), the way things look when they are not being looked at, and where we disconnect from ourselves (in an effort to save ourselves.) Clare points the finger at the viewer and asks, where are you in this?