Artist and teacher Schuyler McClain prefers to use pen and ink, colored pencil, collage, printmaking and watercolor in the studio.
Moorestown resident Schuyler McClain has a space in her home that pops with color, a studio fit for an artist’s dream.
It’s where she; her husband, Geoffrey; and their daughter Emily create original pieces that come from within.
“It’s a lot of fun,” McClain said. “You’ll find me in my studio.”
You’ll also find there brushes, markers, pens, colored pencils and more, all materials that McClain described as interesting and fun.
“These are permanent, which sometimes I really need when I do mixed media because I don’t want them to run when it gets wet,” she explained of a bundle of bright permanent markers. “If you use something that’s not permanent, it will run, and sometimes you want it to, but sometimes you don’t.”
McClain retired in 2009 after teaching art for 32 years. She’s now a full-time studio artist who teaches art workshops and classes to children and adults. Her sessions at Perkins Center for the Arts in Moorestown include watercolor painting for beginners and a workshop on how to weave on a cardboard loom. Both classes are for people 55 and up.
McClain also teaches a winter watercolor painting class at the township library, where her original artwork has been exhibited.
“It seems to be mostly nature,” McClain noted of her inspiration. “I love animals, and I adore plants. Things relating to the beach where I grew up (on Absecon Island off the coast of New Jersey) … I learn from my students, even now. I’ll be teaching beginner watercolor, and someone will do something, and I’ll go, ‘Oh, I would have never thought to do that.’ And then I might go home and try it.
“I don’t believe that you get too old to learn how to do (anything).”
McClain prefers to use pen and ink, colored pencil, collage, printmaking and watercolor. Her goal is to create art that comes from her personal experience and direct encounters with the natural world. Her work appears in art centers and galleries throughout the state, and she’s won numerous awards.
In 2015, McClain and her daughter illustrated a picture book about Italian traditions called “Bella Figlia Della Mamma – Mamma’s Beautiful Daughter.”
“I’ve always loved teaching …” McClain said. “I think I (was) born a teacher. My mother’s mother – who I never got to know (she died before McClain was born) – she was a teacher, so maybe I inherited it from her.”
