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Plum artist's work will be featured at ESAL gallery space in Murrysville library | TribLIVE.com
Murrysville Star

Plum artist's work will be featured at ESAL gallery space in Murrysville library

Patrick Varine
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Artwork by Clare Mears Stefanini
"Fall Reflection," by Plum artist Clare Mears Stefanini.
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Courtesy of ESAL
Plum artist Clare Mears Stefanini poses for a photo in front of one of her paintings, "Bridge Over the River Ketchup."

Clare Mears Stefanini began painting when she was in college at the University of North Carolina’s Wilmington campus. She eventually decided to major in art, and a group of her pieces will be on display throughout June in Murrysville.

Stefanini joined the East Suburban Artists League this past winter, and her work will be featured in the league’s gallery at the Murrysville Community Library beginning June 1.

“The exhibit will be mostly acrylics, with one or two oil-paint pieces,” said Stefanini, a Plum resident who works as a secretary at the Pittsburgh New Church School. “I have a series of smaller paintings of my children doing different things, and I have a painting of Kennywood I did a year or two ago.”

And while most of the gallery will be representational art, created using real objects or people as inspiration, Stefanini has also branched out into some new areas.

“Lately I’ve been working with oil paints a little more,” she said. “I’ve been a little intimidated by oils — you have to use certain percentages of oil to make the paint more viscous or to get the consistency you want. And of course you have to wash your brushes with turpentine.”

Stefanini said acrylics are a little easier to work with.

“If you want the paint to be thinner, you just add a little water,” she said. “But I’ve learned more about oils recently and I’ve been experimenting with them on a couple of portraits.”

Stefanini has also worked with abstract art, including a piece that began by using spray paint on canvas, then rotating the canvas to allow the wet paint to drip in different directions.

“I really enjoy physically making abstract art,” she said. “(That) piece I mostly painted using my fingers, so it was very tactile and fun in that sense. You can really enjoy the process of making it.”

The library exhibit will be mostly focused on home life during the pandemic and images from the Pittsburgh area.

“Right now I’m really enjoying painting portraits and representational work,” she said. “I really enjoy taking a photo I’ve liked for a long time and seeing it transposed into paint.”

Stefanini’s gallery will be featured during regular hours at the library, 4130 Sardis Road in Murrysville.

For library hours and more information, see MurrysvilleLibrary.org or call 724-327-1102. See more of Stefanini’s art on her website.

Patrick Varine is a TribLive reporter covering Delmont, Export and Murrysville. He is a Western Pennsylvania native and joined the Trib in 2010 after working as a reporter and editor with the former Dover Post Co. in Delaware. He can be reached at pvarine@triblive.com.

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Categories: AandE | Local | Murrysville Star | Art & Museums | Plum Advance Leader
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