Clay molds his art with a pencil

By GINA KINSLOW
Glasgow Daily Times

GLASGOW April 17, 2008 04:22 pm

— The work of Glasgow artist Steve Clay is now on display at the Christeen Snavely Art Gallery at the South Central Kentucky Cultural Center.
Clay, who works mostly with graphite and colored pencils, has been drawing for over 30 years.
“I’ve always been kind of artistic,” he said. “When I was a kid it was just coloring in coloring books.”
He didn’t take any art classes until he entered Glasgow High School. It was then that he discovered a love for pencil drawings.
“I do a little painting. I’m not as nearly as good at painting as I am at pencil (drawings),” he said.
Clay began experimenting with colored pencils about five years ago, and while some of his colored pencil drawings are a part of the exhibit, folks will notice there aren’t many.
“I’ve probably done less than 15 in my life,” he said.
Clay does mostly still life drawings. Most of his subjects are of inanimate objects, such as a set of pipes on the wall of the former jail building in Edmonton, the letter “O” in the word prescription on the George J. Ellis Drug Store sign on Glasgow’s Public Square and an old Barren County license plate that was on a car owned by a friend.
The drawing of the license plate is one of the few he did in colored pencil.
“That was on the back of a red Corvair,” he said, looking at the framed print, which sits on an easel in the corner of the gallery.
He hopes to have prints made of the drawing and sell them in the museum gift shop.
Clay’s work has been on display at Arts and Antiques on Glasgow’s Public Square for about five years. He has also entered several art shows and has won many awards for his work.
Earlier this year, he took second place for a drawing he did of a 1934 Ford at the US Bank Art Show. In 2005 he took first place in the same art show for a drawing he did of a log. He has also taken top honors for his work at the Kentucky State Fair.
Several of his drawings have been published in North Light, which are how-to art books, including one of a 1951 Chevy sitting on the side of the road near Griderville.
Clay hopes folks will visit the museum to see his art work. He also hopes his art work will inspire others to become interested in art.
His work will be on display at the museum through the end of May.

Copyright © 1999-2008 cnhi, inc.