Alumna Clare Spooner credits courses she took at UVA with growing her appreciation and love for art into a passion that would become a vocation – with help from a social media post. (Photo by Sanjay Suchak, University Communications)
In June of 2018, Clare Spooner was settled into her work as an interior designer in New York City. Though she loved to paint, the University of Virginia alumna had no expectation at that point that art could become her career.
Until one post on UVA’s Instagram account changed everything.
Spooner loves to paint the Rotunda, using broad strokes in an abstract style with rich colors. She figured it wouldn’t hurt to send the handlers of the University Instagram account a photo of one of her paintings.
Shortly thereafter, while Spooner was on a train to meet an interior design client, a notification came through on her phone saying that she had been tagged by UVA. Then the followers and the messages asking for her paintings flooded in.
“It was so unbelievably exciting,” Spooner said during a recent Zoom interview from New York. “It felt like a million-and-one people wanted the Rotunda … just such a thrill.”
The reaction to the UVA post made her realize that she could potentially make a living out of her passion – and after leaving her job six months later, she did just that by starting her business painting full-time.
Spooner sketches a scene on Grounds during a recent visit to Charlottesville from her home base in New York. (Photo by Sanjay Suchak, University Communications)
Today, through Lucy Clare Spooner Studios, Spooner makes all-original paintings of the Rotunda, as well as watercolor and oil paintings of various motifs and personalized custom work of families, pets and homes. She draws inspiration from nature for her paintings, and visits nearby museums in New York to get ideas and enjoy art history.
While the Instagram post provided the ultimate boost to change her career trajectory, Spooner said there were many other moments, while a student at UVA and after, that pointed her toward what would become her career, even if she didn’t know it at the time.
Spooner always had a connection to art. Her grandfather was an artist, and her parents’ interest in the arts reached her at a young age.
“I grew up really just always around art … and always with a pencil in my hand,” she said.
But during her time at UVA, it was never in her mind to make it her career.
She majored in psychology and French and played on the women’s tennis team. During that time, a sports psychologist encouraged her to consider pursuing clinical psychology. As a result, she worked to attain a distinguished major in psychology in order to be able to pursue a career in therapy. And although the French major seemed to more of a personal interest than a professional calling, it was while studying abroad in France when Spooner had her first thought that it was really art that appealed the most to her.
“I was in this very beautiful, very old city of Lyon with really thoughtful design everywhere, and I also went to or walked by the art museum in Lyon most every day, which is a small-but-mighty museum with a lovely courtyard that can be seen from the street through these massive, intricate doors,” she said. “I remember walking by one day and realizing that whatever lay within those doors would always excite me more than anything else I could imagine.”
Studying in Lyon not only inspired her, but also led her to a new track as a student in the University. In France, she met another UVA student who recommended a School of Architecture course, Lessons in Making, taught by associate professor Sanda Iliescu.
Back in Charlottesville after the study abroad trip, she had forgotten about that recommendation until reading an article by happenstance that reminded her of the course. Spooner rushed to sign up, and on the final day to add classes, needed dean approval to override the credit limit so she could enroll.
Associate Dean Rachel Most, at the time the academic dean for student-athletes, approved the request just before the deadline.
For Spooner, it was a last-minute choice that “completely changed my life,” she said. In Lessons in Making, she learned not just about architecture and design, but also how to really look at the world through a discerning, artful eye, she said.
Later, Spooner ran into Most on the Rotunda steps and let her know how much of a difference getting into the course made in the end.
“Sometimes that happens with really big actions and sometimes with small ones, like allowing a student to take a class ‘just because’ and then finding out later it altered their life,” Most said, who described being part of it as “an absolutely wonderful feeling.”
She has since enjoyed keeping track of Spooner’s art career and watching it progress.
Iliescu, the course professor, suggested other courses that had the same effect on Spooner. One of them, an Architecture School class taught by Pam Black about figure drawing, was “another life-changing class,” Spooner said.
Black encouraged her to continue drawing beyond her time at UVA, leading Spooner to take a sabbatical from her interior design career and attend art school abroad. There, at the Marchutz School of Art in France, two years after beginning work in interior design, she “fell in love completely with painting.”
Since graduating from UVA in 2014, she has stayed connected with the UVA community through the Virginia Club of New York, where she is a board member and co-chairs the arts affiliate group, STUDIO. She sits on the board for the Arts Council at UVA, and frequently visits Charlottesville for art shows and fairs.
“The UVA community has just been so supportive – in New York and Charlottesville, just everywhere,” she said. “They’ve always kind of championed my work.”
The Charlottesville area continues to provide motifs in her work, as well, whether it’s the iconic Rotunda image or a local mountain landscape. She describes her style as “representational,” though many might view her work as impressionistic in style.
“I think I work from life, representationally, and kind of just paint how the spirit moves me,” she said.
Spooner recalled one of her first public art events, held several years ago in her hometown of Williamsburg. A person affiliated with UVA approached her booth, admiring her Rotunda watercolor, and ultimately bought eight of the 10 she had at the show.
That admirer turned out to be UVA’s chief operating officer, J.J. Wagner Davis. She said she gave most of the paintings to colleagues as holiday gifts, but one has a permanent spot on her office wall in O’Neil Hall.
“I was so thrilled to discover her art, and it’s just rewarding to be able to support a former student,” Davis said. “Clare is incredibly talented.”
Spooner has an exhibit coming up in town and plans to show her work at the spring Crozet Arts & Crafts Festival, set for May 13 and 14. She also enjoys talking with UVA students about their ambitions and careers in art.
Asked about her advice to current students, Spooner recommended building relationships and a network – something UVA is well-known for – and being persistent.
“I had a sign in my room when I was growing up that said, ‘If you work hard and are kind, amazing things will happen.’ And it’s just very true,” she said.
