Meet New Orleans-based Emily Lovejoy, a contemporary portrait painter from New Orleans. Lovejoy graduated from the University of New Orleans in 2013 with degrees in Fine Arts and Business Management. An artist as well as a curator, Lovejoy also served as a curatorial intern at the New Orleans Museum of Art from 2012-2013. Her works have been featured in a number of solo and group exhibitions including Art N(OW) – Claire Elizabeth Gallery, New Orleans, LA; Self Absorbed – Treo Gallery, New Orleans, LA; Glow – Arch Enemy Arts, Philadelphia, PA. She has also curated numerous shows in New Orleans, which included local and visiting artists.
Lovejoy’s work utilizes modern technology to create photographs of her subjects, faintly hinting at the times and how image manipulation has an affect on identity. Lovejoy’s vibrant use of color gives her work an unexpected surreal twist, while her technique is one of precision and photorealist quality. Lovejoy employs the use of slow drying acrylics thinly layered from thick gestural brush strokes to small details revealing the precision of each stroke.