Emilia Olson

Oil paintings by Emilia Olson
Opening reception Sunday, October 9, 4-6pm

The Gallery at Highland Center for the Arts is pleased to present Emilia Olson’s Painting with the Past,  

Emilia Olson is a native and current resident of Plainfield, Vermont. She graduated from Montpelier High School in 1997 and from The School of The Museum of Fine Arts (SMFA) and Tufts University in 2002 (BFA). In 2002 Emilia settled back in Montpelier where she runs an interior painting business.

Emilia studied oil painting at SMFA. She also worked as an apprentice to a mural painter while living in Boston, and has painted several commissioned murals in public spaces including Kellogg Hubbard Library.

Artist Statement

After graduating from art school, I took a fifteen-year break from studio painting. I remained close to the medium of paint because of my profession as an interior painter, but I considered creative painting a thing of my past.

During my hiatus, Maureen O’Conner Burgess (the curator of this exhibit) asked if I’d like to show my work. In 2018 the idea of entering the studio felt interesting to me instead of loaded and dreadful, as it had in the past. I said ‘yes’ to putting together a show at Central Vermont Medical Center in 2019.

When thinking about making new work, my mind always revisited to my past work. My parents stored all of it in a plywood box at their house. I decided to dismantle the box and work directly over my old paintings in order to create new paintings. The approach to directly paint with my past has helped me let go and move forward.

There were three canvases in storage along with many paintings on panels. I finished the panels with a loose relationship to the original imagery, but the canvases felt like an assignment from my past. The reference materials of Renaissance paintings and toys were still interesting to me and I felt compelled to finish what I started.