Photos by Brendan Moore Artist Shelly Shaffer works on a painting titled Tres Generaciones, 40" x 40".

Born in San Diego to a single mother who struggled with a variety of addictions, Shelly Shaffer spent her childhood surrounded by endless late-night parties, drugs, alcohol and members of the infamous Hell’s Angels. As she bounced from one foster home to another, and sometimes back with her mother, one thing remained constant: Shaffer’s drive. Others recognized it, and her art talent.

Shaffer explains: “Even from a very young age, I knew that I had to stay focused. I won my first art award at 6 years old, and I felt a sense of validation, love and acceptance that I’d never felt before. Art became my positive outlet. Art became my way out.”

After her high school art teacher secretly submitted samples of her artwork to the Otis Art Institute of Parsons School of Design, Shaffer was offered a college scholarship and moved to downtown Los Angeles. She waited tables as she attended school full-time, and in her classes she learned from the best illustrators in Hollywood. After graduating with honors, Shaffer was hired to teach illustration at California State University, Los Angeles. Because of her success at overcoming her own troubled upbringing, she also was hired by a program that taught college preparatory art to gifted but troubled teenagers and gang members.

Although her career as an illustrator and art instructor gave Shaffer her foundation, it wasn’t until she moved to Sedona, Ariz., in 1993 that she began to paint. Earthquakes, the competitiveness of the illustration field, and a daily four-hour commute convinced Shaffer that she needed to try something new. “Not only did I decide that I wanted to move out of California, but I also decided to become a painter,” she recalls. “The painters all seemed less stressed-out than the illustrators. People thought I was crazy to make such a big change, but I’ve never been afraid to take a leap. I’ve always had to do that. If I had been afraid of change, I never would have gotten anywhere in life.” So she packed up her bags and moved to Arizona.

Brilliantly colored mountains and a village with a towering church are the backdrop for a lone musician in Calling the Days of Music, acrylic on wood, 30" x 30".

During a visit to Tucson, the artist was inspired by the adobe structures, churches and the old barrio neighborhoods, and started to sketch. Back in Sedona, she turned her sketches into paintings. “I just saw my style in my head. It was a blend of illustration, acrylic paints and wood. Now, as I did back then, I start each painting by giving myself an editorial job. I illustrate it and then I go to town with it,” Shaffer says.

She paints directly onto pine panels that she builds herself, sanding and working on them until she is satisfied that they are in the perfect condition for her paintings. “Sometimes I sketch in color until the composition is visually perfect. Then I build the wood panels and project the sketch onto the wood so that I can draw the contour lines. Next, I ask myself what mood I want to capture, and that’s where the vivid color comes in.”

Indeed, in Shaffer’s paintings, color is a main staple. In Keeper of the Doors, for example, deep blue and aqua seas beckon viewers to leave their everyday lives and step into the world that the painting offers. Turtles and fish swim in the water, while, nearby, people on the shores work side-by-side harvesting potatoes and lavender. This painting promises a life that is less stressful and hectic than our day-to-day lives. This, it seems, is a world where work is more than just labor.

If Shaffer’s artworks seem real, it’s partly because she paints what she longs for, and that emotional honesty translates into vivid and clear scenes. “The paintings usually have a lot of family unity, a spiritual base and people working because I’ve always worked,” she comments. “But they’re peacefully working. It’s a labor of love, and their children are working with them. I create places where people are OK with working and where they’re going to go home and eat tortillas, drink some tequila, and then go sit by the water under the moon and pray. Who wouldn’t want that? I paint what my spirit needs. I paint what I didn’t have,” she says.

Sea turtles are an important Native American symbol, says Shaffer. They poke their heads out of the water as Chiapas Indians of Mexico toil nearby in Keeper of the Doors, acrylic on wood, 45" x 42".

Many of Shaffer’s paintings contain churches or missions. She explains: “I love how Mexican towns are wrapped around a Catholic church. It’s really important and inspirational.” In Octubre, a church is set against dramatic red and orange mountains, the fiery sky of a desert sunset, and the softer edges of an apple tree redolent with ripe apples. The paintings are such personal, intimate snapshots of life that they are reminiscent of family photographs. As such, they are at times difficult to part with, Shaffer acknowledges. “Because there are no prints and they never come back to me, letting go of them can be hard sometimes. But I get over it because I know that they are going to the right person, the person who will enjoy them.”

And enjoy them they do—so much so that many people can’t seem to get enough. Collector Bill Clarke says of himself and his wife: “Joan and I own 30 of Shelly’s paintings, some small, some quite big, but all wondrous and wonderful. Her pieces are magical connections to life, and they often have a deep spiritual pull as well. They are bright and full of color. They draw you into the scene, and somehow it feels real.”

Collectors Mike Hughes and Kevin Medivil are no less effusive about Shaffer’s work. “We own 13 Shaffer paintings, and each one has a special meaning to Kevin and me,” Hughes reports. “As Arizona natives, it touched us that her early work was framed with old apple tree cradles from the Oak Creek orchards. Her work is inspiring, stirring, breathtaking, exciting and magnificent. The way she blends colors, characters, animals, skies and churches makes her art unique.”

In 2005, Shaffer realized that it was time for her next challenge, and she opened her own gallery. Two years later, Shaffer The Gallery is concrete proof of just how far this artist has come from her hand-to-mouth background.

She reflects on the evolution of her career: “I have more patience now. As illustrators, we were trained to be quick and accurate, but as I get older, I am slower and more attentive with my creations. People are saying that my newer pieces are so smooth and calming. Honestly, they are where I want to go,” she says. “In the future I’d like to live what I paint, to just disappear into one of my compositions—to move to a small place and live that way every day.”

See more of the artist's work on the Web at ahafferthegallery.com.
See more of the artist’s work on the Web at shafferthegallery.com.