Melissa Clements
Artist in Residence – Cleaver Street B-Side Space
Melissa Clements is a local Perth born artist who draws inspiration from poetry to create extremely moving works that continue to cause waves in the Western Australian art scene. After graduating high school, she went on to complete a Bachelor of Philosophy majoring in Art History and Philosophy at UWA before gaining the opportunity to study a Summer course at the New York Academy of Arts. More recently, she has received a range of grants to help her cement her name into the bustling world of the creative arts and continues to create innovative and thought-provoking work.
After her wildly popular exhibition ‘We Prepare a Face’ in December 2020 at Cleaver Street Studio, we’re so thrilled to be hosting local artist Melissa Clements in a series of painting workshops in our B-side workshop space from June 16th to 19th this year. We thought we’d ask her a few questions ahead of her workshops:
We’re obsessed with your stuff, Mel. How would you describe your art in three words?
Mel: I’d say thoughtful, still and anachronistic
And what do you think we can expect from your brilliant upcoming workshops?
Mel: Well, each workshop provides students with a classical painting technique that is used to create luminosity and realism in portraiture. Appropriate for first time artists, professionals and art teachers, the workshop classes are small and intimate so you’ll gain a wealth of knowledge and experience handling materials and mastering new techniques.
Amazing – we cannot wait. And last, if you could have dinner with any artist from any time period (living or dead), who would you choose and why?
Mel: I would love to have a meal with Michael (Corinne) West, the Abstract Expressionist artist I am currently completing my dissertation on. There are so many unanswered questions about this fascinating mind, and I have endless questions for her about the mystical dimension of painting.
Mel will be running two unique workshops in June. Firstly ‘Verdaccio: Introduction to Renaissance Style Underpainting’ (Thursday 16th and Saturday 18th June) and ‘Mixing Skin Tones: Colour, Value, Chroma’ (Friday 17th and Sunday 19th June). All art materials and canvas panels will be provided, so if you’re interested jump in here before places sell out and follow Mel on socials @melclmnts to be inspired. We’re looking forward to seeing you then!
