Before moving to New York City in 1979, Clayton Patterson studied art at Alberta College of Art, University of Calgary, University of Alberta (Edmonton) and the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design University. He taught printmaking at University of Alberta, etching at NSCAD, and high school art at Memorial Composite High School in Stony Plain, Alberta. He also worked for other artists as a freelance lithographer and print maker.
In 1972 he began living and collaborating with artist Elsa Rensaa; though never married, they have remained lifelong partners. Elsa was born in Norway and raised in Edmonton, Canada. Seeking a more experimental and avant garde art scene, Patterson and Rensaa left Canada and took up residence in lower Manhattan.[when?] In 2015, Mitch Corber created a short documentary video called Ludlow Street with Clayton that features Clayton Patterson walking down the street, discussing its cultural demise due to gentrification.
Since 1999, Patterson and Dietmar Kirves have led NO!art. The NO!Art movement was founded by the late Boris Lurie, Stanley Fisher and Sam Goodman at March gallery, in New York in 1960.

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