Clifton wins unprecedented back-to-back Ducks Unlimited Artist of Year designations

In a competitive artistic career that has produced many big years, 2018 ranks as one of the biggest for wildlife artist Richard Clifton. In an unprecedented decision, the national conservation organization Ducks Unlimited has named Clifton its Artist of the Year for a second consecutive year. He received the honor for 2018 - awarded in 2017 - and was recently announced as the honoree for 2019.

Along with the prestige that comes with the designation, Clifton’s winning artwork of green-winged teal for 2018 and widgeon for 2019 will be featured for sale at Ducks Unlimited events throughout the nation. As he is a professional artist who depends on his paintings to support his family, the awards add up to additional sales from a variety of sources.

Clifton also won the Ducks Unlimited Artist of the Year designation in 2015. These awards place him among the very top of the nation’s and world’s elite waterfowl artists.

Also in 2018, Clifton won, once again, Delaware’s Duck Stamp competition on the strength of his painting of a Labrador retriever and long-tailed ducks. It will appear on the state’s duck stamp for the 2019-20 migratory waterfowl seasons.

He has now won 50 different state duck stamp contests across the United States over his nearly 30-year career as a professional, and also won the federal duck stamp competition for the 2007-08 season. In 1996, he won the Australia Duck Stamp Competition.

As an avid waterfowl hunter in the marshes and fields around his home alongside Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge, Clifton spends a lot of time observing his subjects in great detail. When he’s not hunting with shotgun, he hunts with camera. He wins because he paints, with his acrylics, the subject he loves most. “I think more than anything, I like to paint ducks,” he said at a recent holiday reception. “There’s so much variety and color, I really don’t tire of them.”

View more of Clifton’s work at richardclifton.com.