Lily Koto Olive (b. 1979, in Melbourne, Australia) is a dynamic artist who shape shifts and traverses across many artistic mediums - working with everything from chocolate, smoke, salt, airbrush, spray paint, to digital work, video art, installations,  sculptures, as well as in more traditional 2D work like painting and drawing. Lily's creative approach blends her formal classical painting training with lots of experimentation. Moments of rendered realism juxtaposed against elements of abstracted forms, mythical landscapes and environments create complex imagery that aims to draw you into her world. She received a Bachelor of Art and Design degree from N.C. State University, and went on to gain her Masters of Fine Arts degree from the New York Academy of Art in 2013.

 

Lily emigrated with her family  from Melbourne, Australia to the United States - to Durham, North Carolina - when she was 10 years old. Trading the sun filled land of Oz for the Southeastern USA was not an easy transition but has helped shape and broaden her perspective on community and identity and created a love for travel and discovering new places.  In the last few decades of life, Lily has lived and worked nationally and internationally, spending 10+ years in NYC, several years in Leipzig, Germany, London, UK, and a few months were also spent in Timisoara, Romania, and La Romana, Dominican Republic - where she was award a post-graduate teaching residency to teach a History of Painting Techniques and Contemporary Art course at Altos de Chavon, the Parsons Design School Affiliate.

 

 ​​Lily has exhibited her artworks at Sotheby’s, Flowers Gallery in New York, and Flowers Gallery in London, The New Britain Museum of American Art in New Haven, CT, HERE Arts Center, Sloan Fine Arts, RH Gallery, Kleio Projects and ISE Cultural Foundation in NYC, the Dumbo Arts Center, Trestle Gallery and Janet Kurnatowski Gallery in Brooklyn, NY, Marketplace Gallery in Albany, NY, One Mile Gallery in Kingston, NY, Index Art Center in Newark, NJ, Miami Dade College Museum of Art & Design in Miami, FL, Polk State College in Winter Haven, FL, Carrboro Century Center in Carrboro, NC, Kamakura Performing Arts Center in Kanagawa, Japan, Palazzo Flangini in Venice, Italy, The Museum in Leipzig, Germany, Pilotenkueche/Halle 14 in Leipzig, Germany, Museu d'Historia de la Ciutat de Girona in Girona, Spain, ZSenne in Brussels, Belgium and Galeria Sztuki Współczesnej MD_S in Wroclaw, Poland and more.