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Exhibition Reception & Artist Talk: Friday, April 4th, 2025 | 5:30 - 7:30pm

Paris Gibson Square Museum of Art invites you to experience Figments of the Imagination, an innovative artist installation and large-scale environment created by Helena artist Chip Clawson. Figments of the Imagination is an innovative artist installation and large-scale environment created by Helena artist Chip Clawson. The work, created between 2021 and 2025, embodies a sense of freedom and adventure as defined by his distinctive style utilizing bold sculptural organic shapes and textures combined with mesmerizing intense colors. Clawson is a sculptor known for larger scale concrete and ceramic public and private art installations. More recently, his work has shifted to using digital technology to create large lightweight sculptures and installations that show movement and are joyful, colorful and positive. His work is intended to engage and captivate the imagination of the viewer!

“My work starts with clay sculpture or found objects that I scan with a laser scanner. The digital file is taken into a modeling program and manipulated in many ways. The file is then taken to another program to produce the instructions for the machine and the material of choice. I feel that it is important to create environments that are positive, bright, joyful and engaging to the viewer.

“Digital technology provides the opportunity to change a base sculpture by distortion, segmenting, reconstruction, bending, changing scale and producing sculpture in a variety of materials with a variety of digitally controlled machines. While my current sculptures are produced on machines, they are visually organic and do not look like they were made by machines. My processes are not common in the art world at this time.

“I am often asked the difficult question of how long it takes to make my sculptures. My best answer is fifty years. Seriously. My skills at creating objects have accumulated over the decades. The imagery is an ever-evolving process, often over years, as I increase my knowledge of how to physically build sculptures. Some of the less complicated building processes can be accomplished in a few days. The large or more complicated sculptures can easily take months and even years (for example, my concrete and ceramic sculptures).

“The natural world is the main source of inspiration for my work. As I have spent time enjoying the outdoors, the forms accumulate in my brain and come in a new form as I fulfill my need to create. Sculpture gives me the opportunity to share my visions with others.” –Chip Clawson

This exhibition is curated by Nicole Maria Evans, Chief Curator & Director of Curatorial Affairs at Paris Gibson Square Museum of Art. Exhibitions at the museum are supported in part by the Montana Arts Council, a state agency funded by the State of Montana, and the National Endowment for the Arts. We are funded in part by coal severance taxes paid based upon coal mined in Montana and deposited in Montana's cultural and aesthetic projects trust fund. Additional funding is provided by museum members and the citizens of Cascade County, Davidson Family Foundation, D.A. Davidson, Montana Credit Union, Hotel Arvon, First Interstate Bank, Gordon McConnell, an anonymous donor, Kelly’s Signs & Design, and Fire Artisan Pizza.