Meet Heather Olsen

We recently connected with Heather Olsen and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Heather, appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?

I get my resilience from having to overcome many hardships. As a child and into my young adult years, I endured sexual, mental, and even physical abuse from the ones I trusted most. Having to learn to survive and overcome such extreme mentally demanding challenges, I discovered that it didn’t matter how many times I got knocked down, I always learned to pick myself back up and keep going. During my art career, I think this is one of the biggest reasons I never gave up even when times were tough. As a kid, art was my outlet. I became obsessed with painting and drawing, spending hours in my room working on a single piece of artwork. Art was my escape. By focusing on my art, I could dive deeper into my imagination and try to forget about all the mental and emotional pain I was experiencing in reality. As I got older, that obsession only grew and my knowledge and ability grew with it. I find that because of this, I’m not so easily discouraged when I get rejected from a show, or my work gets criticized. I will keep painting and drawing, because that’s what I always do, no matter what life throws my way.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

I just enjoy painting, whether it’s a narrative scene, figure, landscape, animal, or still life. My work is particular in that it is very emotional; I enjoy capturing the emotion or essence of my subject matter. I use expressive brushstrokes and bold colors which gives my work a very palpable energy. I enjoy creating work that makes the viewer feel something – whether it’s remembering a distant memory or feeling something deep, I want to inspire wonder and connection within my work. I am excited to be one of 75 artists selected from around the world to travel to Spain in April for a Quarantine Art Mentorship. I will be working with six mentors who will help me dive deep within myself and explore my own artistic journey. I am curious to see how my art will evolve after this wonderful creative opportunity.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

1. Devotion – I have a (probably slightly unhealthy) obsession with getting better and continually pushing forward in my art career. I don’t give up, and I’m dedicated to my craft.
2. Practice – This goes along with devotion, but the single most important thing you can do to better yourself as an artist is just to keep doing it. Even if it’s only for 10 minutes a day, just keep practicing. It’s literally the only way to get better.
3. Confidence – While this is always a work-in-progress, I think that having confidence both in yourself and your artwork goes a long way. Confidence applies not only to having faith in yourself as you create, but also trusting the work as it evolves with you.

To close, maybe we can chat about your parents and what they did that was particularly impactful for you?

The biggest thing my parents did for me was to notice my inclination towards art at such a young age and get me into a neighborhood kids art class when I was 8-year-old. That is where my passion and love of art really took off. I looked forward to it every single week. When I became an adult, I was faced with a difficult decision of quitting my beloved career as a special education teacher to pursue art full-time. My parents were pivotal in encouraging me to take the leap of faith into the unknown and follow my art. To this day, my parents are still big supporters of my artwork.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://heatherolsenart.com
• Instagram: @heatherolsenart
• Facebook: Heather Olsen Art
• Linkedin: @heatherolsenart
• Twitter: @heatherolsenart
• Youtube: Heather Olsen Art