Rocklin painter Connie McLennan grew up accompanying her father, a veterinarian, on his calls amidst the natural beauty of Mt. Shasta and the surrounding countryside. She drew and painted from an early age and was first “published” in 1958 at age 4, when the San Francisco Chronicle chose her as a weekly “Junior Art Champion.”
After graduating from CSU, Sacramento with a BA degree in journalism, Connie studied illustration at San Francisco’s Academy of Art, then began work as a freelance illustrator. Over the next three decades she completed a variety of local and national advertising, institutional and publishing projects, including 14 children’s books. Since 2011 she has illustrated only occasionally and dedicated more time to painting.
In 2017 she put away her brushes entirely to obtain an AA in legal studies. Following a short stint as an estate paralegal, she wrote and illustrated The Forest in the Trees and in 2020 returned to painting.
Connie says: “In 2011, a mentor imparted a kernel of understanding about the impressionists’ use of color, arguing that its sympathetic and emotional impact on viewers is more important than subject matter or accuracy of drawing. This insight became my challenge and focus. Though currently dabbling in abstracts, I will always be a recovering illustrator—not necessarily a realist, but perhaps a confirmed “representational-ist.” Regardless of the subject, what inspires me most is color.”
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