Clayton Schonberger

18’’ X 24’’

Acrylic on Canvas

1982

At the dawn of time, lost on a mysterious desert plain she stands alone, top layer secured with a nut to hold it all together during the continuation. Her eye speaks, “…can it all be as sad as it seems…?” Stored within her layers are lettuce, a hot hamburger patty, cheese, and what may be a suggestion of exposed feminine parts.

Her “photogenetic” quality is undeniable; but will there ever be, in this register, a male to notice it?

A surreal vision painted between high school and college, it was surprisingly precocious, resulting in extra attention of certain students and faculty at the University of Nebraska.

16’’ X 22’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2016

Composed of much brighter colors than the 1916 original by the master of 20^th century art, Pablo Ruiz Picasso, this cubist painting is from a period when I was copying the modern masters with the desire to learn more about painting.

18’’ X 24’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2016

The last sunlight of the day hits a golden castle on a promontory in a tidal area, beneath a threatening sky. I see it as a final bastion. Walls secure against the barbarian horde, a dream-place to retreat with one’s family and nestle during a long period of worldly suffering.

24’’ X 38’’

Oil on Canvas

2017

Fishing boats, tossed on the Pacific Ocean during a squall.

3’ X 4’

Acrylic on Canvas

2019

Sometimes, trouble is where you least expect it. In pleasure, there is often danger.

The observer cannot see without being affected by what is seen. The eye is a magnet, waiting to apprehend information.

16’’ X 20’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2017

Canadians will recognize this copy of Emily Carr’s Northwest First People Totem Pole. Emily Carr is perhaps Canada’s best-loved painter.

I first saw this painting in the Vancouver Art Gallery, and I was so impressed that I decided to copy it.

20’’ x 18’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2017

Before Covid-19, and perhaps afterward, ideal places in the world will be visited for getaways.

16’’ X 20’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2017

A Hummingbird draws the nectar from flowers. An idealization of the view from our deck looking out to Puget Sound here in Washington State.

20’’ X 16’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2019

There are reasons we don’t go far into the swamp at night.

32″ X 24″

Acrylic on Canvas

2021

20’’ X 30’’

Crayon and Cray-pas on Paper

1990

Under the water is the shifting flow of thick energy, filled with life.

30’’X 24’’

Oil on Canvas

A magpie perches in an abstract thicket. Few birds can talk, but many of them can fly. If only we were so lucky.

20’’ X 30’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2020

The Iconic singer, pictured in a scene from “A Star is Born.”

24’’ X 32’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2006

Marriage can be complicated.

Acrylic on Canvas

24’’ x 24’’

2022

Painted in honor of the Year of the Tiger in the Chinese Zodiac, 2022.

32’’ X 48’’

Acrylic and Oilstick on Canvas

1995

In many relationships, there comes a time when it is over.

32’’ X 48’’

Acrylic and Oilstick on Canvas

1996

One of many large canvases painted in the 1990’s. I belonged to several artist’s co-ops, an art organization, showed at coffee houses, bars and nightclubs, and sold many works of art. This one sold for $400.

18’’ X 30’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2014

Some themes I have worked on consistently are included in this abstraction: cross hatching in color, scimitar- or dagger-like forms, and spirals.

18’’ X 24’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2018

Part of a series of geometric abstractions I painted during 2018. Flat areas of carefully chosen colors arranged in a unified and pleasing design.

16’’ X 20’’

Watercolor

1981

A Scholastic Art Award Honorable Mention winner the year it was painted, when I was a Junior in High School. I was interested in surrealism and felt like my good side and bad side were pulling me in two directions at once. Here is the interpretation of that experience, in watercolor.

8-1/2’’ X 11’’

Ballpoint Pen on Paper

2014

An abstract design from a sketchbook I took to Hawaii that year.

8-1/2’’ X 11’’

Ballpoint Pen 

2012

An illustration from the novel The Edge of Nightslayer.The Pyramid “flies…” In this image, it sits on a giant landing pad next to “The Great Tree” in Elfland (yes, The Edge of Nightslayer is a fantasy novel…” The Pyramid can magically pass through the space between the worlds and across the solar reach. It holds five-thousand people and their supplies for their long journeys to the Elf -world of Foresti. The Great Tree is the Home of the Red Sun Elves. The tree is an empathic, ancient oak that spiritually guides the Red Sun Elves.

8-1/2’’ X 11’’

Pencil on Graph Paper

1978

A sketch of a location from my imagination made when I was a teenager for pencil and paper Dungeons and Dragons.

32″ X 48″

Acrylic, Spray Paint, and Oilstick on Canvas

1995

Spinning in a mass of confusion the world is out of balance in all of the ways that cannot be reversed.

32’’ X 48’’

Acrylic on Canvas

1995

The absurd abstraction of a man’s head and shoulders from the country of Oompah Music.

The garish color scheme blares like a German Brass Band.

The distortion figure is meant to add to the overall “loudness” of the image. It was meant to get noticed in a dark club where a 1990’s Party called a “Rave” was going on. The Rave music (1990’s improvised electronica) was loud, so the image had to be.

24’’ X 32’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2018

A geometric abstraction, homage to industrial performance art.

20’’ X 32’’

Oil on Canvas

2019

She dances and undulates across the sand in all her watery glory.

24’’X 32’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2010

As opposed to the Tarot Card’s magician. A bit more primitive than all that. No “illusions of grandeur.” Or delusions either. Truly, the magic in life is all academic.

24’’X 30’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2012

Where does life originate?

What is the first cause?

Love is the answer to both questions.

20’’ X 16’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2019

Is he a stranger to all who meet him and everyone he knows, or does he know no one, and everybody treats him like a stranger?

The man of mystery, who keeps to himself and is like an island far away at sea, may eventually find there is a time when he needs others.

The world can seem so cold, then, when the outsider is wanting for the bond of human company.

For true friendship is as rare as gold, and as much a gift as a time of giving.

16’’ X 20’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2016

In the Hamburger Club…where plots thicken like a double-malted milkshake and lunch is eaten….We could save the world…or destroy it.

Would you like fries with that or onion rings? It’s all extra, and there are no clear boundaries…Only CHOICES made.

16’’ X 20’’

2016

Acrylic on Canvas

At one time, America was the leader of the Free World.

At one time.

20’’ X 16’’

2017

Acrylic on Canvas

A horse will return to its stall when the barn is on fire. Getting a horse to leave a burning barn is hazardous, for you have to blindfold the animal and lead it to a corral. It may know there is danger, but instincts tell it the stall has food, comfort and safety.

Don’t be a horse. When your hypothetical barn is on fire, leave.

16’’ X 20’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2008

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on Canvas

2008

16’’ X 20’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2008

16’’ X 20’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2008

18’’ X 24”

Acrylic on Canvas

1984

The barrier between life and death is redemption.

18’’ X 24’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2015

The minarets of the Middle Ages reach like a modern city skyline into the multicolored heavens. These elements come together in an idealized version of impregnability and power. The moat and reinforced walls will offer little insulation against the coming assault, a combination of outrage and religious extremism.

24’’ X 32’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2017

The curling forms I am so fond of blended smoothly here and combined with Chinese scrollwork.

32’’ X 24’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2016

In my interpretation of Picasso’s girlfriend Marie-Therese Walter, one sees an eye reflecting innocence and surprise, while the other eye is in shadow, showing deliberation and danger. The right eye is how Marie-Therese saw the world when she met Picasso at age 17. The left eye is her experienced self after being mistreated and separated from the master for so many years. Picasso kept their relationship a secret during his marriage to Olga Khokhlova, almost the entire time he and Walter were together, 1927-35. Eventually, he split with Marie-Therese for the Surrealist Photographer Dora Maar.

In 1977 at the age of 68, Marie-Therese committed suicide.

22’’X 24’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2017

In enlightenment, the eyes in your head can be closed. But the “third eye” remains open.

36’’ X 24’’

Acrylic on Canvas

1986

The Crucifixion of Jesus aged 33, which took place after 3 ½ years of his ministry. The Romans may have nailed a sign to his cross telling of the crime he was executed for. In Latin, “INRI” meant “King of the Jews.”

16’’ X 20’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2015

Paul Cezanne said, “With an apple, I will astonish Paris.” He also said, “A work of art which did not begin in emotion is not art.” Cezanne is one of the artists I most respect, so naturally, I have copied several of his works. Here is Cezanne’s Table, in bright modern acrylic colors.

18″ X 24″

Acrylic on canvas

2015

Early in his career, Matisse was grouped with painters known as the “Fauves,” which translates to “Wild Beasts.” His bright, expressionist color was a gateway to modernism. Late in life, due to illness, Matisse could no longer paint…so he applied what he knew about art draftsmanship to collaged paper cut-outs that were perfection in 2-Dimensional design.

Seen here is Matisse’s “Bathing Woman.” Please forgive the liberties I took with the Great Master’s original proportions.

8.5’’ X 11’’

Ballpoint Pen

2010

Here is one of several drawings for the Bladeborn Novel Series with Cathedrals as the subject matter. In the book, the people of the Yellow Sun built many temples to their god, “The Nameless One.” The Cathedrals, set apart from the rest of the city, only allowed Priests and the initiated to enter the temples.

8.5 X 11’’

Ballpoint Pen

2010

8.5’’ X 11’’

Ballpoint Pen

2014

Will my small corner of the world ever resemble this idealized view of Bellevue, Washington, USA? The way the Bellevue City council allows the city to grow exponentially makes me believe the answer is yes.

8.5’’ X 11’’

Pen and Ink

1978

This is a pen and ink drawing from when I was 16 years old. Barry Windsor Smith of Marvel Comics and Moebius of Heavy Metal Magazine inspired me in this drawing.

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on Canvas

2017

This painting is the cover of the book “The Telesynthetic War,” part 2 of the Telesynthetic Series.

The painting depicts a close-up of the head and shoulders of a Geno-born Cyborg. The Geno-born are President Roth’s perfect soldiers, fed telepathic orders through a complex “pattern.” Only Jeremy Callahan, the book’s protagonist, can unlock the pattern when the inevitable war comes.

4′ X 3′

Mixed media on canvas

1998

From 1998’s ‘Capitalism will save the World’ show in Denver, Colorado’s at C.O.R.E. New Art Space.

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on canvas

2016

This is a vignette concerning the journey taken in life.

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on Canvas

2015

By detuning vision while looking at a night’s sky the city speaks to us.

18″ X 24″

Oilstick on canvas

1983

North America’s First Peoples were the initial casualties in the war on People of Color waged by European settlers.

18″ X 24″

Acrylic on canvas

2014

The rainy season in the Garden Isle of the Hawaiian Archipelago features sudden rain storms with extra rainbows.

Digital art piece

2010

While visiting Palm Desert, California, I took the time to sketch out this youth using Photoshop one winter.

18″ X 24″

Acrylic on canvas

2018

The twists of geometry here are woven into the form of a mountain.

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on canvas

2015

In modern day holy wars we search for the Grail full of crude oil.

It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.

3′ X 4′

Acrylic on canvas

1996

The baseball player pictured here knocks one out of the park.

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on canvas

2018

Here pictured, my Iranian friend, Mojdah Diba, gazes out restfully at the viewer. She is a gentle soul who worked on this painting with me one Christmas.“Come to God” is written at the bottom of the picture in both English and Farsi. The background is loosely based on a famous image made by a 16^th-century Persian artist.

3′ X 4′

Mixed media on canvas

1995

The very moment when Ms. Muffet realizes a spider has sat down beside her.

11″ X 17″

Oil on canvas board

2018

3′ X 4′

Mixed media on canvas

1995

Another in a series done for raves in the Denver, CO area. This picture needed to be louder than the music and more eye grabbing than the multimedia displays.

15″ X 15″

Acrylic on canvas

2012

The door is closing on this young man’s jail cell. He was convicted of his third count of Driving While Intoxicated. Now, he deals with different bars, not for drinking in, but for being imprisoned by. When they are opened and closed are still his most significant concerns.

18″ X 24″

Acrylic on canvas

2016

Viewed from the north to the south, we see Bellevue on the painting’s left side and Queen Anne Hill on the right. In the foreground is the countryside past Everett heading toward Marysville. In the lower middle ground of this idealized version of our city, you can see the U-District and Bothell.

I reprint an excerpt from a song popular in my childhood about Seattle. (Written by Perry Como): “The bluest skies you’ve ever seen are in Seattle
And the hills the greenest green in Seattle
Like a beautiful child growing up free and wild
Full of hopes and full of fears
Full of laughter full of tears
Full of dreams to last the years in Seattle
In Seattle”

30″ X 22″

Acrylic on canvas

2013

Before the beach is crowded the shadows are long.

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on canvas

2017

Van Gogh once said: “I knew well enough that one could fracture one’s legs and arms and recover afterward, but I did not know that you could fracture the brain in your head and recover from that too.”

20″ X 16″

Acrylic on canvas

2016

For an artist and a writer the muse can be ephemeral.

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on Canvas

2019

Simple pleasures like a ferris wheel or colorful balloons are enough to satisfy the spirit of childhood.

8-1/2″ X 11″

Ballpoint Pen on Paper

With Photoshop

2012

A drawing for the Bladeborn Novel “The Edge of Nightslayer.”

8.5″ X 11″

Ballpoint Pen and Photoshop

2013

A drawing for the Bladeborn Novel “The Edge of Nightslayer.” This city is where the King of the Hells ruled from, surrounded by minor and major Devil-kin. It is where Bladeborn confronts the Adjudicator, who owns the souls of Bladeborn’s people.

8.5″ X 11″

Ballpoint Pen and Photoshop

2013

For the Bladeborn Novel “The Edge of Nightslayer.”

In the book, Glacier Town is in the port-city on the Continent of Ice. From here, the People of the Yellow Sun Launch their attack on the Ice Elves.

8.5″ X 11″

Ballpoint Pen and Photoshop

2013

This drawing depicts the fortress complex built by the Dark Elves of Foresti in the only pass between the southern lands and the lands of the Red Sun Elves. The Dark Elves come to the red sun side of Draconia to destroy Nightslayer, the Sword of the Ancients and kill Bladeborn. Their power is so great that they nearly succeed.

8.5″ X 11″

Ballpoint Pen and Photoshop

2013

In the Abyss, the Demon Lord of Ogres, Krogh, rules from a rusted throne here. The eggs depicted are a new generation of Ogre Wizards spawned from Krogh’s blood through the magic of Salavastra, the last of the Draconians.

18″ X 24″

Acrylic on Canvas

2021

One can play golf on a real course all their lives and never get a hole in one. My father has had three.

24″ X 24″

Acrylic and Spray Paint on Canvas

2021

The fascination with dinosaurs, as expressed in a Non-Objective Surrealist picture.

20″ X 24″

Acrylic on Canvas

2021

“I want to paint a Dragon,” the 7-year-old boy Qi Ran told me. So we did.

8.5″ X 11″

Ballpoint Pen on Paper and Photoshop

2021

In the book “Bladeborn Uprising,” Bladeborn saves the infant pictured here from his father, a diabolically evil noble. Yoris, the baby’s mother, is not wealthy, but she will raise the child to be a good person instead of greedy and brutal.

8.5″ X 11″

Ballpoint Pen on Paper and Photoshop

2021

Lurking in the old infirmary, a place where thousands died of plague a generation ago, the Skeletal Lord awaits its next victim. The feet of the magical spirit hovers just above the floor of the sepulcher.

8.5″ X 11″

Ballpoint Pen on Paper and Photoshop

2021

Zipzorag, The Demon Lord of Nightmares, in battle with Bladeborn amid the trash and refuse at the gate of Fortress City.

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on Canvas

2018

The beauteous woman holds both night and day.

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on Canvas

2018

In a coastal area, a happy aspirant of yoga takes the “dancer” form.

16″ X 20″

Acrylic on Canvas

2016

No wind. No sail. No oars. Just the currents of the vast ocean move the boat, and even the tides are still. Now is the time when inner motivation must take place, and you must have faith that a ship will soon come.

20″ X 24″

Acrylic on Canvas

2020

A face that combines the abstract and the idealized is represented in this Non-Objective Surrealist painting.

24″ X 24″

Acrylic on Canvas

2019

In utter chaos, the world dashes forward. On spindly, inadequate legs, ever moving forward…going somewhere, anywhere.

3′ X 4′

Acrylic and Texture Gel Canvas

1996

Exemplifying how one can see the forest but not the trees. “Where are the grapes?” “They are plain as the nose on your face.”

16’’ X 20’’

Acrylic on Canvas

1989

Old Testament “Yahweh” of the West. Genocide, infanticide, the destruction of entire peoples—these are among the acts of violence commanded or condoned by Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament. But are they acts of God or acts of humanity “through” God?

3’ X 4’

Acrylic on Canvas

1995

There is the way. And then there is the path which I have travelled.

Mother and Child, Spring 2021

Acrylic on Canvas Board

18’’ x 16’’

2021

Acrylic and Spray Paint on Canvas

32’’ x 24’’

2018

Clearly, humans aren’t the first intelligent life on Earth.

Some may argue that currently, there is no intelligent life on Earth.

We aren’t the first to have an organized society, nor  have we been organized for very long, considering  the entirety of Earth’s history.

We aren’t the first. But we may be the last.

18’’ x 24’’

Acrylic on Canvas

2019

As Romance sets sail for far horizons, the perpetually marooned traveler finds little solace in the high seas of love.

Perhaps, after he runs out of food, he will begin to eat himself. If hungry enough.

Acrylic on Canvas

20’’ x 18’’

2016

Perhaps the best-loved and most widely recognized modern painting ever.