While I don’t pretend to have a firm grasp on spirituality, I know that I feel the most connection and peace when I am close to nature. Hence, much of my artistic inspiration is derived there. I love bringing gifts from nature, such as feathers and shells, to my studio, when I’m not giving them to my kids, who love them as well.

I seek daily solace walking in the forest near my home as it renews my soul. My current art practice seeks the same sense of wonder and magic I feel when I am amongst the trees with my feet on springy moss, or while imagining that the luna moth that briefly landed, did so as a small nod to our common presence. I’m a woman squarely in the sandwich generation. I have come to realize that art is a form of self care which I have gifted myself as a relief to the demands of giving to others in the remaining facets of my life.

I also love reading, and it has been my other lifelong passion since I was a young girl. My favorite books are rich in atmosphere. At some point, I came to realize that just as alternative worlds are inked so vividly in my favorite books, I was dreaming up similar worlds with my chosen media: paint, graphite, charcoal. I paint a wide variety of moods - from light and ethereal, to lush and mysterious with a hint of dark enchantment. I hope you love the worlds I create.

My process begins intuitively, though I usually choose a limited palette in advance. I then allow the paint and other mediums to lead the way. I love experimenting with varying degrees of opacity and transparency and how they create a sense of visual depth. My surface and brush feel almost like a ouija board and pointer where an idea is springing forth of its own volition. When that concept reveals itself, I follow its trail. The work is ultimately finished in a push and pull of intuitive painting combined with a more analytical process of editing, to obtain the atmosphere for which the piece is calling.

Artist Biography

Mary Claire Tillotson was born and raised in Spartanburg, South Carolina, where she lived in a rural setting and grew up with a pencil, paints, or a book always in hand. Her environment was an early influence, her creativity fueled by exploring the woods and foothills of the Upstate along with later explorations to more far-away places. She attended Governor’s School for the Arts and then studied fine arts at Winthrop University, focusing primarily on drawing and painting. Thereafter, she pursued law, became a trial attorney, and began raising two boys with her husband. She lived in Atlanta, Georgia, Tampa, Florida, and Chicago, Illinois with her family before returning to the South and settling in Charlotte, North Carolina, where she plans to stay.

She returned to art approximately five years ago, and after a period of exploration, found that she resonated with an abstract visual language to express her viewpoint. She paints primarily with acrylics with some elements of mixed media. Her current practice focuses on shifting light and luminosity using value and color, and visual depth through varied paint and medium viscosities. Since returning to her art practice, she has exhibited both locally and internationally with a global arts collective of which she is a founding member.