(Untitled Abstraction)

Barbara Olmsted

Barbara Olmsted’s 1930s and 40s work reflects the changing tides of modern art in the early half of the 20th century. The bulk of her oeuvre was rooted in surrealism and evolved into non-representational abstract expressionism. One hallmark of this path is her use of gestural line, attributed in some respects to Atelier 17 founder Stanley William Hayter, with whom she and her husband, Frederick Olmsted, studied during the workshop’s original iteration in Paris in the late 1930s. Later in her life she went on to become an early organic farmer.

Using a Surrealist perspective accompanied by organic shapes and linear patterns that seem to float, Olmsted creates a curious back and forth movement that keep the whole composition in a Surreal balance. This impression is signed and dated in the lower right corner of the image and was done at Atelier 17 in New York.

Olmsted's work was represented in the important 1944 exhibition at The Museum of Modern Art in New York titled Hayter and Studio 17 which included 60 prints by 32 artists from 12 nations.

After divorcing Fred Olmsted in 1944, Barbara married Winston Petty in 1945. They operated a walnut orchard and a landscaping business in Danville, California. In 1954, they moved to a seventy-acre farm near Mt. Angel, Oregon to continue organic farming. After her divorce from Winston, Barbara relocated to Silverton, Oregon in 1959 where she married Al Phillips and began a long and successful career in real estate. She was a member of the Oregon State Grange, Redland Chapter, and was an official pianist for fifty years.

Family and friends feted her for her 98th birthday and Barbara passed away peacefully at home two weeks later on May 21, 2013.