Artist: Nancy Andruk Olson Title: Conception Material: Watercolor on Paper About the artist: Nancy Andruk Olson has been a lifetime painter. She started painting as a child with her mother, who is an art teacher, and never really stopped. Raised in Los Angeles, she spent her childhood regularly attending museums with her family. Most notably the Norton Simon Museum, which has a significant impressionist and post-impressionist collection. These images remain firmly implanted in her mind and are where she continues to draw her aesthetic. She attended Art Center College of Design as a high school student and has a BFA in painting from BYU where she spent most of her time working with Bruce Hixson Smith. She also has a post-baccalaureate certificate from The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Nancy Andruk Olson creates lush, dreamlike landscapes that are reminiscent of an imagined world. Her work provides an escape through vibrant color and broad, loose brushstrokes. She paints quickly and directly using a lot of impressionist techniques. She likes the improvisation and the interaction of the paint. The interplay of the materials and the intensity of the color are part of the language for her. She makes a lot of her own paint to ensure the intensity of the pigment is as high as possible. She is inspired by other artists who focus on color to capture memories such as Pierre Bonnard, Wolf Kahn, Inka Essenhigh, and John McCallister. She just finished the Artist in Residence Program at the Bountiful Davis Art Center.
