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A lifelong fascination with shapes, especially
with those made by shadows, is apparent in
most of Jan McLaughlin's alkyd paintings on
canvas. Sparkling sunlight and the resulting
shadow patterns are a recurring theme in much
of her work.
Jan studied design at the University of California
at Davis (plus a summer of studying art history
in Guadalajara, Mexico) before transferring to
receive her degree in sociology from Arizona
State University. After graduation, she spent
thirteen years, both full-and part-time, as a
probation officer and youth supervisor at the
Juvenile Court Center in Phoenix. During that
time, she pursued her artwork by studying
privately for short segments of time with a
number of instructors, including Mary DeLoyht-
Arendt and William Schimmel, Jr. Painting has
been her full-time career since 1987.
In order to depict the vibrant color that she
perceives in shadows, she experimented until
she came up with a technique where she
would stipple very thin layers of color over one
another, blending visually rather than physically.
She has received numerous awards for her
work in juried exhibitions, many as a part of her
membership in the Arizona Artists Guild, and has
served as a juror and guest speaker for several
arts organizations. In the past, her work has
been represented by galleries in Laguna Beach,
Sedona, Santa Fe, Wickenburg and Scottsdale,
and has been seen in Decor, Phoenix Home
and Gardens and Arizona Foothills Magazines.
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