Donald Saaf

Artist Bio Artist Work

Click HERE to read about Donald Saaf: A Creative Mind at Fishink Blog

Click HERE to sing along with Donald Saaf perfoming on YouTube with the Little Hope String Band

Click HERE to read Suzanne Corsano's interview with Donald Saaf and Julia Zanes

Click HERE to read about Donald Saaf and Julia Zanes at the Brattleboro Museum

Click HERE to read about THE BLUEBIRD THEATER, a marionette and puppet troupe created by Donald Saaf, Julia Zanes and their two sons Isak and Oluf

Donald Saaf has been showing his unusual figurative paintings at Clark Gallery since 1991. With each new body of work, the cast of characters depicted grows and changes. The scenes in his paintings, as well as the people within, are inspired in many ways by the artist's own life and family. Working in acrylic, gouache, and collage, his work features vibrant colors, patterns, and simple surroundings that make each painting a tantalizing environment with an oddly curious feel. Donald Saaf is a graduate of the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and has been showing nationally for twenty years. His work has been reviewed in The Boston Globe, The Boston Herald and Art New England. In addition to being an important American painter, Saaf is the author of numerous award winning children’s books and performs on a variety of instruments with the Little Hope String Band. With Julia Zanes and their two sons, Isak and Oluf, they formed The Bluebird Theater, a marionette and puppet troupe.

Artist Statement

For the past 20 years, I have been exploring the place where fine art and folk art intersect. My subject matter draws from the local experience of community, family, and immediate surroundings as well as an internal dream place. Although some of the imagery is very personal, I am always striving for the universal. The figures in the pictures are simultaneously ‘me’ and a sort of ‘Everyman’.

I usually begin with a compositional idea, and once that is established, I let things grow organically. At times, I approach a composition like a quilt, or even a stained glass window, breaking down the composition into luminous forms and shapes. I try to see the pictures simultaneously both for their ‘story’ and as pure abstraction. Often, there are different layers in the paintings. Some of the figures will have several heads; one that seems more solid and others that look more transparent and ghostly, hinting perhaps at the passage of time or suggesting that reality is more pliable than we usually think. They might be a representation of the soul or perhaps just a symbol for the many levels of personal consciousness.

I’m interested in memory; the memory of place and experience. The memory of walking down a street imagining the view from a birds eye view, while simultaneously seeing a house in the distance, noticing small objects on the ground and briefly experiencing other people’s lives as they pass by. It’s the moment that happens when the external world overlaps with the internal world.

Education

1990 Traveling Fellowship, Oaxaca, Mexico
1989 Fifth Year Certificate, The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA

Residencies

2014

Fellowship Vermont Studio Center

1989

SMFA Traveling Fellowship

Public and Corporate Collections

Brattleboro Courthouse
Wellington International
Brattleboro Memorial Hospital
Bridgeport Hospital
Okemo Mountain Resort
The Eric Carle Museum

Awards

2013

Artist Fellowship Grant

2007

The Oppenheim Gold Toy Award

1988

The Boit Competition

Selected Exhibitions

2017

Julia Zanes and Donald Saaf, The Currier Center, The Putney School, Putney, VT

2016

Parables, The Kent Museum, Calais, VT
Paintings, Mitchell Giddings Fine Arts, Brattleboro, VT

2015

Contemporary Folk Paintings, The Brattleboro Museum and Art Center, Brattleboro, VT
New Paintings, The Clark Gallery, Lincoln, MA

2014

Village Paintings, The Swedish Church, NYC
Visions, The Laffer Gallery, NY
Visions and Inventions, The George Marshall Store Gallery, York, ME

2013

The Stuff of Which All Are Made, The Clark Gallery, Lincoln, MA

2012

New Paintings, Cynthia Reeves Gallery, Hanover, NH
The Eric Carle Museum, Amherst, MA

2011

One Thousand Voices All At Once, The Clark Gallery, Lincoln, MA

2010

Public Art Project, Brattleboro Courthouse, Brattleboro, VT

2009

Clark Gallery, Lincoln, MA

2008

George Marshall Store Gallery, ME
Trees, Spheris Gallery, Hanover, NH

2007 Outdoor Sculpture Show, Harvard, MA
Visions and Voices of Children’s Book Illustrators
New Art Center, Newton, MA

2006

Uncommon Worlds: The Art of Julia Zanes and Donald Saaf,
Clark Gallery, Lincoln, MA

2005

People and Places: The Work of Donald Saaf and Julia Zanes
The Brattleboro Museum, Brattleboro, VT
The Woods, Clark Gallery, Lincoln, MA

2004

New Paintings, Spheris Gallery, Bellows Falls, Vermont

2003

New Paintings, Clark Gallery, Lincoln, MA

2001

Whirligigs, Groton School Gallery, Groton, MA

1989

Traveling Fellowship Show, The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA

Bibliography

Crain, Victoria, The Rutland Herald, Brattleboro Museum right now, May 2015 Bernard, Pam, Donald Saaf at Cynthia Reeves Review, Art New England, January 2012
Bergeron, Chris, Puppets Come to Life at New Art Center in Newton, MetroWest Daily News, March 21, 2010
Thornton, Clara Rose, Southerly Exposure: Cutting a Riff: Rural Art and Human Anxiety, The Rut-land Herald, November 19, 2009
Around Every Corner, Okemo Magazine, 2009 Family’s Artistic Vision, The Commons, April 2009, The Edges of Reality, Fairytale, The Valley News, January 2008
Hirsch, Corin, Art Baucom, Caitlin, One Hanson, Alex, Painting on Taylor, Denise, Drawing on Children’s Book Illustrators, The Boston Globe, March 29, 2007
Sills, Leslie, Uncommon Worlds; The Art of Julia Zanes and Donald Saaf, Catalog 2006
Calabria, Susan, People and Places; The Art of Donald Saaf and Julia Zanes, Brattleboro Museum Catalog August 2005
Sano, Suzanne, Allegorical Paintings, catalog 2003
Norma, Tales To Tell, American Style, Winter 2002/2003
Art That Aims To Empower, The Boston Globe, June 17, 1999
Best Illustrated Books, Cincinnati Enquirer, December 1, 1998
McQuaid, Cate, Toying With Reality, The Boston Globe, November 13, 1997
Martin, Paintings for Children and Adults, The Boston Globe, November 13, 1997
Unger, Miles, Paintings from Nova Scotia, Art New England, August 1995
Caillouet, Katie, Go Figuration, The Loyola Maroon, January 1992
Silver, Joanne, Raw Materials Meet Artistic Vision at Clark, Boston Herald, July 20, 1990
Sherman, Mary, Art Turns Its Focus To Ideas, The Boston Globe, July 12, 1990
Carlock, Marty, “Raw Vision, an Exhibit of Pure Creativity of Clark, Town Crier, 1990
Sterpka, Dorothy, Artist Donald Saaf Follows His Own Vision, West Hartford News, July 15, 1989
McQuaid, Cate, Pearce, Sara, 1998’s Cor- Wilson,