Meet Olivia Snyder | Potter, Painter, Maker

We had the good fortune of connecting with Olivia Snyder and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Olivia, why did you decide to pursue a creative path?
I’ve always been an artist, and my folks were brewers with their own brewery. So, there has always been encouragement from them to pursue my interests, and go my own way.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
As my life is now, my art fits into a bell curve: it started out with rainbows, unicorns, and sparkly fairies. When I studied in college, my art was highly conceptual and abstract with sophisticated earth colors and veered into performance art. Now that I’m middle-aged, it’s gone back to rainbows and sparkly fairies. There’s a certain amount of delight I derive from people walking up to my work and exclaiming how cute it is, or how they’ve not seen something like it before.

Colors and sparkles and glitter tickle that part of the brain that triggers nostalgia in people, especially women. In academia, graphic design and “too much” color are often frowned on, or looked at as unsophisticated. But being able to remind someone of a happy time in their life just by creating an object of magic and love is, I think, a privileged thing. I work hard to try to do that. Graphic design and crafts and making are just as valid as “fine art” in their ability to help people connect to cultures, particularly in how accessible many crafts and forms of making there are. Anyone can be a maker! It just takes time, your brain, and some sort of material.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
You are asking an absolute homebody to go out and entertain! I love to go out and eat, though. In the greater DFW area? Pizza is the food of kings, with my #1 pizza joint being 5th Street Pizza in Allen, #2 joint Heirloom Pizza in Plano. For a treat, I love Fat Straws drinks and their donuts.

If we’re gonna hang out? Libraries are awesome, and Plano has some of the best. I go several times a week, to study, to teach, to chat with maker buddies. Sometimes the maker buddies and I also go to TheLab.ms, a makerspace that started in Plano. Recently I discovered Soft Spots Risograph Press in Dallas, which is super-fun to visit and make art at! Small hidden pockets of making and makers are where it’s at.

I realize my idea of exciting is visiting supply stores like Trinity Ceramics, Elliot’s, or Clampitt Paper, but that’s where I get the stuff to make the stuff! Which is the ultimate fun!

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
My husband and best friend give me more support, encouragement, and critiquing than I could ever ask for. If I ever hit a creative block, he gets me over it. If I am unsure about a zine or pottery piece I have make, he will give me honest feedback. If I get home from a show completely exhausted, he will have pizza on the table. I could not do it without him.

Website: https://faeriehive.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/olisny/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/olisny/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/olisny

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/faeriehive

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@olisny

Other: Fediverse – olisny@www.olisny.com

Image Credits
Olivia Snyder