LEXINGTON, Ky. (WKYT) – As part of the Breeders’ Cup, guest artists will be on hand, including one in the 1936 Room creating watercolor portraits of horses.
“I honestly don’t know a time in my life when I didn’t have art as a part of it,” said Noa Artemisia Clare, who signs her work as Artemisia Clare.
From oils to watercolors
Clare, an oil painter for over a decade, changed mediums two months ago on the first day of Keeneland sales.
She said she was going through a difficult time after learning her grandfather was dying.
“I felt like sand, just drifting. I didn’t know where my place was. I didn’t know where to go. So I said, well, if you feel this way, there are two things you know that you love. And that’s horses, and that’s art,” Clare said. “So I picked up the watercolors that I had, and I pulled myself to the auction. I dragged myself there, and I sat down, and I said, look, you can’t think the bad thoughts if you’re painting every single hip number.”
After giving a painting to an auction winner, word spread about Clare’s live painting.
“I went from this, you know, oil painter who was in a not-so-good place to suddenly the watercolor girl who’s spending every single waking moment just painting horses,” she said.
Guest artist at Breeders’ Cup
Known now as “Watercolor Girl”, Clare was invited to be a guest artist during the Breeders’ Cup.
“I’ll be wandering around and running around with my little backpack, just painting away fast, documenting everything I can going out of the cup here,” she said. “I jokingly call myself a burnt-out amateur sometimes. But now I mostly call myself, I don’t know, the happy amateur.”
After the Breeders’ Cup, the Lexington-based artist plans to continue painting horses in watercolor. Clare says she is inspired by a musical, Sunday in the Park with George, to continue her passion.
“There’s this one quote: anything you do, if it comes from you, then it will be new, and so I told myself, well, maybe I can make something. Maybe it can mean something. Maybe I’ll hate it, but maybe someone else will love it,” Clare explained. “The point is you just, you get out there, and you make it. And sometimes you go out, and nothing happens. Sometimes you go out, and you have a bad day. But sometimes you go out like I did and you have a day that changes your entire life.”
Examples of Artemisia Clare’s work can be found on her website.
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