George Clinton Talks SCAD Exhibition, ‘Cloaked in a Cloud, Disguised in the Sky’
The exhibition is on view until January 25, 2025, at the SCAD Museum of Art in Savannah, Georgia.
Image courtesy of SCAD.
Since the 1950s, George Clinton has been known as the founder of the timeless and paradigmatic group Parliament Funkadelic. He’s acclaimed as Starchild, Dr. Funkenstein, Mr. Wiggles, and the Prime Minister of Funk. But what people don’t know about him is that before he was a musician, he was a barber. There, he learned the artistries of precision, styling, and versatility. Since then, he knew music wasn’t his only calling — but art was, too.
He’s dedicated his career (and authentic, unapologetic personality) to pioneering genres, fashion trends, and unpredictable collaborations. Clinton, who knows no bounds, is now a renowned artist and has been creating unconventional paintings and drawings since the 1990s. When Clinton began to sign autographs, he incorporated doodles, and a drawing of a dog became infamous and priceless.
For the first time, Clinton is showing decades of unseen artwork at the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) Museum of Art in collaboration with artist and Clinton’s longtime friend Overton Loyd. Cloaked in a Cloud, Disguised in the Sky is an array of Clinton’s most experimental, improvised, and innovative works, reminiscent of the unrivaled music he’s made as Parliament Funkadelic. Through a maximalist hybrid aesthetic, he gives viewers his lens of the Black American experience through Afrofuturism and Funkadelic cosmology.
From forgotten notebook sketches and grandeur collages to Clinton’s iconic costumes, Cloaked in a Cloud, Disguised in the Sky is filled with vibrant technicolor. When many people think of Funkadelic, “technicolor” is one of the first words that come to mind. As he evolved as an artist, he grew to know more about colors and palettes. We often wonder how this is possible because Clinton has a rare form of color blindness; he can only see in black and white. But when you walk through the exhibition, you would think he’s seeing more colors than the human eye can behold.
1202 MAGAZINE was honored to sit down with the legendary Clinton to discuss how and why he began making art, why he chose to display it now, and how Cloaked in a Cloud, Disguised in the Sky is just the beginning of the bountiful pieces of art he’s eager to create and display — sooner than later.
How are you feeling now that you’re displaying decades of unseen art for the first time?
I’m still feeling it! It feels good. I haven’t processed it yet. I’m just starting to feel everything and questioning what I feel. Once I get started, I’ll be ready for the next piece. I’m not about standing still. When I find out there’s a party, I’m ready to dance.
So, you don’t want this to marinate. You’re you ready to move on to the next art project?
I want this, here, to go on tour around the world — sitting in Japan or something. I want to start something new.
What inspired you to begin painting and drawing?
I was always into it. I would lay around and doodle, trying to make it make sense or look good in the frames for the past 20 years. I’ve always been greedy about it. Music and art from the ‘50s and ‘60s, when rock and roll was beginning, were always about visuals, dancing, singing, costuming, and theatrics. I just broke all of that up into pieces, like a singing group, a rock band, an orchestra, and then a record company. Everyone was singing together as friends — a tribe of dumpasaurus people, clones, or what we call — characters. Characters live longer than people. We call it the Parliament Funkadelic ‘thang,’ not a group, not a movement. It’s a ‘thang.’
It was just one colossal concept that turned into iconography.
The Afrofuturism gave us more room for that. We can stretch it into outer space, where we identify with dough guns, nomos, and Anunnakis, as opposed to aliens and gods. As long as it has a booty, it can dance.
Can you elaborate on Parliament Funkadelic’s cosmology?
You keep these characters forever. You vaguely identify with myths you’ve read over the years and make up your own version of them. Think of Dr. Funkenstein, Clone, Starchild, and Image of the Chosen. The mission is to bring the funk to the planet and become one nation under a groove, leave the planet, and go back to Nibiru, where we came from.
How did you come up with these names?
I don’t know. They just pop up in my psyche. I watch a lot of sci-fi movies. I was a Star Trek freak. Star Wars and Close Encounters came after us. They borrowed from us, and we borrowed back. Then we went underwater, and that’s part of the mothership connection, which is part of the large art piece in the exhibition.
Going back a few years ago, Anderson Cooper invited you on his show to talk about how you painted birdhouses during the pandemic. Can you talk more about that moment?
I was just learning how to get shit trending on the internet. I found people doing things around the house. We were figuring things out. We had to come off the road because of the pandemic. I needed something to do. It was a pandemic project. The first thing we started doing was painting and filming it. My wife bought a bunch of birdhouses. Anderson called me up and asked me to talk about it. After we posted it, we started trending. I then realized that this was a way to talk to fans. We played old music in our videos while we made the birdhouses, filmed us swimming in the backyard, and shows we played. I didn’t know what it would mean, but I knew it would mean something.
Image courtesy of SCAD.
What emotions and feelings do you experience when painting and drawing, especially during the pandemic?
Happy, if anything. I have a clear plan to get the people engaged. At a certain point (during the pandemic), it became impossible to try to get on the radio with a new record. Even dealing with record labels slowed down. Finding a new way of communicating with fans regardless of what else happened got us a good following with sold-out shows.
You probably would’ve sold out the shows regardless.
You always have to dance with what’s going on. We were actually able to deliver and put records out with artists like Kendrick Lamar. I’m able to maintain relationships with whoever’s doing the new version of stuff just by being there and being available.
Do you have any favorite pieces in your exhibition?
It’s one of the dog paintings.
Why is that your favorite?
The dog has grown and become a signature character. I used to draw it as an autograph.
Many of your pieces are very colorful or incorporate technicolor. How can you achieve this by being color blind and only seeing black and white? Do you write the colors on each palette and easel?
I used to do that, but it became a joke among the kids when they were young. They would switch the colors, even if it wasn’t on purpose. After a while, I got to working, and it didn’t matter or they would get mixed up, and a new color was created. Then, I would have to explain to Overton which colors got mixed up. Being a barber is when it came in. I’m used to being able to fade and shape hair. The techniques come in handy because I didn’t use color variations.
How have you evolved in your art since you first started?
Being neat. I’m all over the place when I’m painting. I’ve become more organized. It can become a lot of nothing.
What message do you want Cloaked in a Cloud, Disguised in the Sky to convey to viewers?
Free your mind. Your ass will follow.
