The Olson House (Conceptual Model)

The Olson House is the most portrayed individual home in the history of American painting and one that was a strong source of inspiration for American painter Andrew Wyeth, whom I deeply admire. This conceptual model is a homage not only to Andrew Wyeth, but above all to Christina & Alvaro Olson, whom lived at the now famous "Olson House" until 1967 when they died. When I have presented this piece in@public, I usually treat it like a “pop-up” book as I tell the story of the house, of Wyeth and his paintings, and the story of Christina and Alvaro. The model piece is entirely based on the actual building with specs as the distribution of the rooms made from a virtual interior mapping done by the Farmsworth Museum of Art in Maine. Also I used images made by me from n a visit to the grounds in 2015 and all the paintings by Andrew Wyeth, from the book “Andrew Wyeth: Christina’s World and the Olson House (2011). The roof comes out for all 3 buildings (main house, kitchen, and Alvaro's shed), as well as each independent floor on the house. Each room has been decorated with flower motif paper, as a way to pay tribute to Christina, who is said to have loved placing flowers on the rooms of the house where she could reach. The kitchen also is filled with beans, as it’s told that Christina’s stews were legendary. Also, each room is filled with trinkets and items that I personally associate not only with the history of the house, but also with Wyeth's paintings and the body of work he built in Maine, which I personally feel is completely different to the body of work he created in his second home in a Chads Ford, Pennsylvania. The items include seashells (the sea), an old watch (time stopped), keys (privacy), fishing hooks (Alvaro’s abandoned fisherman life), etc, etc.