Bio & Artist Statement
Olivia was born in 1979 at Quezon City, Philippines. At the age of 4, she immigrated to Rochester, New York. She attended The School of the Arts middle and high school, experiencing vocal music, musical theatre, dance, printmaking, and sculpture in ceramics and wood. Her interest in creative expression led her to visit Central, South and North America, Southeast Asia and Europe. She sought the universal link between individual differences in order to understand the direction of art in America. Her early experiences with art gave her mind the capacity to accept varied forms of art and culture and to see these as expressions of individual and group consciousness.
After receiving Divisional Honors in Ceramic Sculpture with her BFA, cum laude at the School of Art and Design at Alfred University, New York State College of Ceramics, she decided to embark upon the study of realist drawing, painting and sculpture techniques at the Florence Academy of Art in Florence, Italy. At the completion of studying and briefly teaching there, she moved her studies to the towns of Carrara and Pietrasanta, Italy to practice techniques in bronze casting and stone carving.
She returned to Rochester, NY in 2010 to make a new home for her ongoing study of the movement of the body expressed through drawing, painting, ceramics, cast glass and bronze.
In 2018 she made 13 Bicentennial Frederick Douglass Sculptures for the not-for-profit Rochester Community Television in 6.5 months with the help of 150+ volunteers. The statues have had a positive effect on the community, even when the project suffered two vandalizations on Dec. 15, 2018 and July 16, 2020 which were widely covered by national and international media including the Democrat & Chronicle, Rochester City News, NY Times, BBC, NPR, CNN, Tweeted by President Trump and local news stations and radio. The stories have been added to a national discussion over the subjects of monuments in America and Restorative Justice within the judicial system. Both Re-Installations brought about feelings of renewal, community solidarity and spurred numerous community discussions/programs to understand the source of divide between groups.
Olivia continues to push forward to innovate within her field, exploring the profound qualities of sculpture media and how body language can have a positive effect on the viewer. She is currently working on a Road Map that will help to streamline the process of having public sculpture made. The Map is meant to promote public dialogue so that groups may creatively contribute to the local, national, and international landscape. Alongside exhibiting in galleries in museums in America and Europe, private and public commissions, she is an Adjunct Professor, teaching Figure Sculpture at the Rochester Institute of Technology.
Olivia’s work is displayed publicly and privately in America, Australia and Europe.