No matter the medium, an artist’s work is her own language. Painter Kathy Clem took that a step further. She invented her own alphabet.
“If you’re an artist, you have to have a style, or that’s what everybody says, anyways,” Clem said. “But I decided not to have a style. I wanted to learn a lot of different things, so the things that I was interested in became a letter of my alphabet.”
Clem’s diverse and colorful work, made across 40 years, lines the tall, wide, industrial walls of her new gallery, the Kathy Clem Museo de Arte, located in Winton Place. Her letters — inspired by constellations, street art and amino acids — hang on one wall near iPhone paintings of a cat, a 16-foot abstract exploration of memory and a small house covered entirely in felt.
These projects have names like “Y is for Yes,” “M is for Mother” and “W is for Woman,” playing with the concept of a letter’s meaning in our lives. The Museo’s grand opening is set for October 16, when its latest installation, “C is for Community,” will begin showcasing work across various mediums from local artists.
Museo manager Michelle Garrett said the inaugural show aims to bring together artists as diverse as Clem’s own catalog.
“From newer artists to very experienced artists, we want to show it all because Kathy, as you can see, is not one to be in a box,” Garrett said. “It’s important to us to also not put anyone else in a box with their art.”
But that kind of platform is only possible because of the life 76-year-old Clem has lived, one filled with detours, artistic trial and error and a coffee plantation in Central America.
She was born in San Francisco but spent much time in the El Salvadorian municipality of Berlin on that plantation, which her grandfather started. Clem left and attended what is now SUNY Canton in Northern New York, near the St. Lawrence River.
“Women in El Salvador didn’t have that much, and (the country) had a lot of revolutions,” she said. “If you started going to college, you might not finish.”
Clem graduated first in her class. When Kodak hired her as a chemist, she came to Rochester. She stayed at the company for a decade until her artistic leanings beckoned her in a different direction — namely, toward an MFA from the Rochester Institute of Technology.
Between then and now, more than four decades of artistic practice yielded enough pieces to open her own gallery. Clem previously had a studio in the Anderson Arts Building.
“Kathy really wanted a legacy place to be able to show her work,” Garrett said of the initial idea for the Museo.
With some help from Garrett, a self-described “theater kid” who’s worked with Geva Theatre and Rochester Fringe Festival, Clem found an old gym in Brighton and converted its cavernous warehouse vibes into a large canvas.
Vibrant photographs of plates adorned with carne asada, flan and cheese pupusas — El Salvadorian family recipes — that Clem cooked herself. A series of small painted animals, plants and stars representing the sights of her own backyard. Photo portraits of vast orange canyons in the American Southwest.
“I’m a painter, and I can paint with felt or I can paint with acrylics or oils or with the iPhone,” Clem said.
The most arresting piece is also Clem’s most accessible. Steps from the gallery’s front door stands a 10-by-12-foot house whose very existence is a testament to positive, creative action. Community members assembled for felting classes, pulling and layering sheep’s wool into different shapes of various sizes to adorn the structure.
“Every shape is different and flowy and naturally does its own thing, which is very much what Kathy’s art is about as well,” Garrett said.
The furniture is felt. The candles on the mantel (and the mantel itself) are felt. And a large quilt hanging on the wall is felt, assembled by folks who took the classes taught by fiber artist Myranda Gillow, who welcomed many first-ever felters who got their hands on the fiber and immediately leaned into the playfulness of the project.
“The warm and fuzzies of fiber translate really well tactilely into warm and fuzzies of the heart,” Gillow said. “It has a magical ability to kind of put people at ease and make people curious, and the more they want to touch and feel, the more they want to play.”
Those who took the class each contributed a square of the quilt, Gillow said, which allowed them to feel accomplished. They also walked away with a newfound sense of community.
“Part of why we named the house ‘Y is for Yes’ is because when Kathy was first starting out on this project, she just heard a lot of people saying ‘no’ or ‘you’re kind of crazy to do it,’” Garrett said.
But the idea persisted. Clem was inspired by the immersive visual-projection exhibition of Vincent van Gogh’s dreamy paintings that came to town in 2022.
The house at the center of “Y is for Yes,” much like the upcoming “C is for Community” show, stands as a compass for what Clem and Garrett hope the new gallery can accomplish.
“It’s a metaphor for the Museo,” Clem said.
And with a library, workshop and nearly 5,000 square feet, there is simply more space at the Museo than at other galleries in the area. If an artist dreams big and creates big, the Museo can ideally provide a place for it to be seen and appreciated — no matter which language or alphabet it uses. kathyclemmuseodearte.com
