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Irene Hardwicke Olivieri’s paintings are a continuing meditation on
her life, as well as a reaction to it. Her style encompasses an
uncensored, obsessive quality that records her inner feelings and
deals with personal events in a cathartic manner. Little House In My
Heart confronts the deaths of pivotal people in her relationship
sphere. Olivieri recasts the pain of loss into a memorial offering.
Painting on a weathered hand carved bowl chosen specifically to
evoke the subtext of a coffin, the result is a visual memorial.
Using the female figure that appears in her ongoing body of work as
an anchor, she combines narrative with text that is both a pictorial
and intellectual component. In the leaves forming a crown above the
head, she chronicles the deceased individuals and bizarre
circumstances precipitating their demise. In the lower half of the
narrative Olivieri questions, “How will I die?” Engaging in a
dialogue about burial customs and ecology, she incorporates her
recurrent themes about nature, animals, predatory birds, and
crawling insects that are dismissed as repellent. The subterranean
portion of the image is intertwined with the earthly eroticism of
the sensual female figure, reflecting the inclusive perspective of
death as a part of life.
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Little house in my heart
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