At a mature 22 years old, Kaua‘i resident Emily Miller will be presenting her first solo show at the Kaua‘i Museum beginning next Thursday. Miller will be uniting her figurative watercolor painting with abstract sculpture for the first time in
At a mature 22 years old, Kaua‘i resident Emily Miller will be presenting her first solo show at the Kaua‘i Museum beginning next Thursday. Miller will be uniting her figurative watercolor painting with abstract sculpture for the first time in one show — she looks forward to bringing both sides of her artistic vision together at the Kaua‘i Museum.
Miller grew up in Los Angeles before moving to Kaua‘i with her family in 2001. Attracted to art since the age of 8, Miller substituted traditional schooling with taking art classes at Santa Monica Community College throughout her teens. “I was studying mostly painting and photography at SMC, focusing on urban life, architectural subject matter and the goth/punk scene.”
Moving to Kaua‘i brought light and natural beauty into Miller’s work, “My work in L.A. was much darker.” Focusing on landscapes and aging sugar mills, Miller tries to “bring to light the everyday, the beautiful things you might just walk by and not notice.” Where others might see a decaying building as an eyesore, Miller has found her subject matter.
Having immersed herself with Kaua‘i’s art organizations (GIAC and KSA) Miller has gained much from older working artists. “I am a board member at Kaua‘i Recycling for the Arts and have learned a lot from Kathy Cowan.” This show will feature some of Miller’s glass work she has completed in the past year.
Working professionally as a graphic designer helps support her fine art work, though the young artist is planning on going back to school in the future.
While she is prolific in several mediums that explore both realism and abstraction, watercolor and sculpture respectively, Miller is less sure about the conceptual framework for this work, and leaves much of the outcome to her own process.
“Many artists work in more than one medium, but they rarely show it all together. I am excited about having a show that presents both sides of me,” said Miller explaining that the cohesive ‘divergence’ in her work is rooted in a single source, “my touch.”
