Art convos

Artist Shane McClatchey sees painting as more than just color on canvas—it’s a way of paying attention, of turning fleeting moments into something lasting. Whether he’s in the classroom, the ocean, or walking his baby down the street, he’s always observing. Always connecting. And it shows.

Shane McClatchey lives a life woven together by many threads—painter, teacher, father, surfer, observer. To him, those roles aren’t separate—they’re part of the same orbit, circling a center that’s less about control and more about being fully alive. In a world that often demands specialization and speed, Shane leans into something different: integration, curiosity, and presence. And that’s what makes his work—and his life—so quietly powerful.

Originally from New Jersey, Shane came to California to study art at LCAD, drawn less by rankings or faculty credentials and more by the pull of the ocean. “I just liked the beach,” he says, “I like being in the water.” He first pursued graphic design, envisioning himself working in the surf industry—painting boards, designing bathing suits. And he did. He got the internship. Saw his designs printed. But something about the corporate machine made him pause. It felt hollow. “A huge buzzkill,” he called it.

Around that time, he signed up for a life drawing class. The moment he got his hands on charcoal and started drawing people from observation, something clicked. “Just going and getting my hands dirty… it was a breath of fresh air.” That class didn’t just change his major—it shifted his entire direction. Drawing the human figure became his anchor. It grounded him in the real, in the present, in the texture of life.

Now, Shane teaches life drawing himself—sharing what first sparked his own creative path. He teaches students how to look, how to slow down, how to care about what they’re seeing. For Shane, teaching isn’t just a job—it’s an extension of his artistic practice. The act of explaining something simply forces him to understand it deeply. Whether it’s anatomy or composition, presence or perception, he learns alongside his students. “All the clichés are true,” he says. “They give me energy. They make me want to paint.”

Presence threads through everything he does. Whether it’s cooking dinner for his family (a process he admits sometimes takes three hours because he loves it), folding laundry, or sharpening a pencil—he tries to show up fully. He’s not interested in rushing. “I want to be there for it,” he says. “Even if it’s just walking my baby around the block for hours, noticing the way the light hits a house I’ve walked past a hundred times.”

This kind of seeing—the slow, intentional kind—informs his painting. His work is deeply observational, but also emotionally expansive. One series explores swimmers in chaotic water—bodies fractured and distorted, blurring into the waves, into the sky, into each other. It’s based on memories from lifeguard races, but it’s more than that. It’s about disorientation, competition, violence, beauty. He talks about those scenes the way someone might describe a dream or a flashback—“a vortex of chaos.” A place where you either keep your head down and move fast, or you look up and risk getting lost. But sometimes, he says, it’s worth it to lift your head. To see where you’re going. Even if it slows you down.

His painting titled Everything Must Go embodies that philosophy. At first glance, it’s just a wetsuit suspended in midair. But a banner plane in the sky changes everything. “Everything Must Go,” it reads—like a liquidation sale. Absurd, out of place. But that’s the point. Shane had been holding onto that image for years, waiting for the right moment to paint it. When it finally came together, the piece became about mortality, presence, and effort. “It means I’m going to die,” he said. “But it also means if I want to be present—if I want to really be here—it’s going to take everything I have.”

Shane’s life—by his own admission—is chaotic. He and his wife are raising two young boys. He teaches multiple art classes. He paints. He surfs. He tries to stay open, even when it’s hard. He admits there are days when it all feels like too much, when just getting the kids into the car feels like an impossible task. But then one of them stops to admire a rock, or a plant, and he reminds himself to slow down and notice it too.

“Everything touches everything else,” he says. His kids help him notice the world in new ways. Surfing reminds him to let go of control. Teaching forces him to articulate his thoughts. Painting lets him process it all. None of it is compartmentalized—it’s all part of the same current. He doesn’t see blocks between disciplines or between moments. “There’s just too much I want to make,” he said.

Even grief becomes part of his art. One painting, created while his wife was pregnant, originally featured just her—standing in a wetsuit, the fabric stretching around her growing belly. Their dog died during that time, and the piece evolved. He added a wave on the horizon—representing both the baby to come and the dog who had passed. The wave is a metaphor he returns to often. “It’s not the water,” he says. “It’s the pattern that moves through it.” Life, for him, is the same. Ever-changing form. Fleeting shape. But meaningful, if we’re paying attention.

His advice to his students—and to his own kids—is this: Don’t chase someone else’s definition of success. Ask yourself what you want your actual day to look like. What would make you feel alive? Then go in that direction, even if it’s messy, even if it’s not linear, even if it doesn’t make sense on paper.

As he said in a message after our interview, “Making art and living a life is all about how we make meaning out of our experiences. How we define meaning and see patterns in the noise is how we decide what’s important. I think attention is a form of love—what we notice and pay attention to is up to us. I feel that as a painter and as a dad.”

Follow Shane McClatchey
🌐 Website: www.shanemcclatchey.com
📸 Instagram: @shanemcclatchey
🎨 Represented by Kennedy Contemporary in Newport Beach, CA