MAURICE CLARKE  BIO/CV

Born in Drogheda Ireland in 1965.

Under the guidance of the two Drogheda artists: Richard Moore and Raphael Hynes, Maurice was introduced to oil painting ‘en plein air’ at aged 14.

Building a portfolio of paintings he secured a place at 17 years of age and attended the National College of Art and Design Dublin for three years.

Whilst on his ‘foundation’ year during a painting block, the Artist and teacher Charlie Brady took Maurice’s hands in his and after looking at them closely declared:

“You my boy, are an artist!”

Fate however took him down a different route..

In 1988/89 while studying Footwear design on a two year National BTEC diploma course at Corwainers Technical College in London,  Maurice won ‘The Royal Society for the Arts’ design bursaries award 1988 which allowed him to attend the ARSUTORIA SCHOOL Milan 1990, after-which he set up his design studio in Florence and worked as a freelance consultant for luxury good brands in New York, London, Milan,Tokyo, Hong Kong, Paris, Shanghai, Munich and Dubai among others until 2018.

Discovering in 2018 and spending time painting at the ‘Art with Love’ Foundation in Florence, he shifted his creativity back to painting and art.

In 2019 he moved to a cottage on the island of Giudecca in Venice to paint and attend the Bottega del Tintoretto school in Cannaregio.

Living and painting through the Pandemic in Venice, he finally left in March’ 2022 to set up a painting studio in his hometown of Drogheda, where he has lived and worked since.