Interview
Esther Hoflick
Moving from her childhood home, a rural community north of Peterborough, Ontario, Esther Hoflick completed her B.A. Honours in Studio Arts from the University of Guelph in 2007 - with a minor in English Literature. In 2012, the artist moved to Montreal where she lived and worked until her MFA at the University of Ottawa, 2017-19. The artist also occasionally spends summers camping in Dawson City, Yukon and currently, is a professor of Fine Arts at Northwestern Polytechnic in Northern Alberta. Hoflick was the co-founder of Night Owl Contemporary, a gallery for emerging artists in Montreal, and ran The Living Art Room, a small community-based art school. She worked as curator for Artbomb Montreal, a daily auction of Canadian art, and received a grant from the Québec Jeunes Volontaires program, as well as the Alberta Foundation for the Arts. She has worked as a studio assistant for painters Peter Barron and Richard Hayman in Peterborough, Don Russell, in Guelph, and John Brown, in Toronto. Her work has been exhibited at Artspace, in Peterborough; the Art Gallery of Guelph; Espace Projet, in Montreal; Galerie UQO, in Gatineau, QC, and Gallery Karsh Mason in Ottawa, among others.
What is your background and how did you start your journey in the art world?
“Years of growing up in a household that valued creativity shaped my early interest in the arts. My father, an architectural draftsman, and the stories I’ve heard about my great-grandmother, a Theosophical lecturer and psychic medium, inspired me to think deeply about materials, ideas, and how they connect the physical and metaphysical. My grandmother, who read tea leaves, was the first to inspire me to be an artist. Her influence sparked my fascination with intuition and visual metaphor.
Education played a key role in refining my passion. While pursuing my B.A. in Studio Arts, I began to explore how art could bridge personal and universal narratives. During my MFA, I expanded this exploration through a deeper engagement with new materialism, focusing on how the materials I use can reflect layered connections between memory, experience, and our perceptions of the world. These formative years laid the foundation for my current practice, which continues to engage with questions of connection and meaning.
Since then, my practice has focused on creating work that evokes resonance between clarity and ambiguity. I aim to encourage viewers to pause, reflect, and challenge their perceptions, fostering a deeper connection to their internal and external worlds.”
What inspires you?
“While patterns emerge in nature, I am fascinated by the ways they also manifest in human interaction and memory. These patterns often reveal connections and shared experiences that transcend individual moments, which I aim to capture in my work. Memory, in particular, plays a central role - how it is shaped, reinterpreted, and preserved, or how it fades and transforms.
Emotion and perception are equally important to my practice. I am deeply inspired by the interplay of internal processes and external experiences, exploring how they shape and reshape our understanding of the world. These explorations drive me to create works that translate these interactions into visual form, inviting viewers to engage with their own interpretations and memories.”
What themes do you pursue? Is there an underlying message in your work?
“Weaving themes of interconnection, memory, and emotional resonance, my work reflects the layered and shifting nature of perception. I am particularly drawn to liminal spaces - those thresholds between clarity and ambiguity, presence and absence - where meaning begins to emerge. My compositions invite viewers to reflect on their own responses to these spaces and uncover deeper layers of interpretation.
Exploration of the universal through the personal is another central theme in my work. By highlighting shared experiences and emotions, I aim to create pieces that resonate with viewers on multiple levels. This connection is at the heart of my practice - it’s about fostering recognition, dialogue, and a sense of discovery.”
How would you describe your work?
“Visually, my work is characterized by its layered, textured surfaces and a palette that shifts between muted tones and vibrant hues, depending on the emotional tenor of the piece. I work with materials like plaster, oil emulsion, graphite, and colored pencil, which create rich, tactile surfaces and intricate details that invite closer inspection. The interplay between smooth and carved textures adds a dynamic quality, as if the viewer is uncovering a memory embedded within the material itself. While my work often feels ethereal and layered, it is grounded in careful consideration of materiality and meaning. Each piece becomes a meditation on what it means to navigate our physical and emotional worlds. My current series on plaster reflects imagined relics from a forgotten past where gender equality was essential, tying into my feminist approach to highlighting internal processes often left unspoken.
Geometric lines, reminiscent of architectural drawings, frequently appear in my compositions, introducing a sense of structure and precision amidst the abstraction. These lines connect to my father’s influence as an architectural draftsman, grounding the organic qualities of the work with a sense of spatial order. This juxtaposition mirrors the tension between the tangible and intangible, personal and universal. Each work is created to evoke emotional, personal, and universal reflection on what it means to be human - charting our relationships with memory, the tangible world, and the invisible forces that shape our experiences. The pieces in this series exist in a duality - fragile yet solid, abstract yet resonant—creating a sense of timelessness that invites viewers to reflect on their own connections to the past, present, and future.”
Which artists influence you most?
“While many artists inspire me, I find myself especially drawn to the spiritualist painters. Hilma af Klint, Odilon Redon, and Paul Klee have deeply influenced my approach to abstraction and metaphysical themes, especially in their ability to weave symbolism and intuition into their compositions. Their work resonates with my interest in bridging the personal and universal, reflecting a shared desire to explore the unseen and interconnected. Helen Frankenthaler’s innovative use of color and Patterson Ewan’s mastery of texture have also influenced my approach to painting. Ewan’s ability to translate narrative and emotion into physical form aligns with my interest in creating tactile, resonant works. As John Brown’s studio assistant, I developed an appreciation for his mastery of texture and his ability to imbue material with a sense of narrative and history. My father’s background in architecture informs my exploration of sacred geometry, which I use to represent the interconnectivity of our perceptions to the physical world.”
“Weaving themes of interconnection, memory, and emotional resonance, my work reflects the layered and shifting nature of perception.”
What is your creative process like?
“Exploration is central to my creative process. I often begin by observing small, fleeting moments—a shadow, a texture, or a quiet interaction. These observations spark ideas that evolve through layering paint and other materials, creating rich, tactile surfaces. My process often involves adding to and subtracting from the surface, building a dialogue between what is revealed and what remains hidden. Working with oil emulsion on plaster has been a pivotal part of my practice. This technique allows paint to embed deeply into the surface while maintaining the ability to carve into it, creating a dynamic interplay of textures and layers. This material mirrors my conceptual interest in memory, as both are layered and shifting, revealing traces of what came before. In my studio, I immerse myself in music, allowing its rhythm and mood to guide my process as my mind wanders freely. This reflective state helps me intuitively select colors and textures that resonate with the emotions and ideas I’m exploring. I’m constantly seeking ways to create a dialogue between my personal experiences and the universal, using color, texture, and obscured imagery to evoke these shared themes and invite viewers to engage with their own interpretations.”
What is an artist’s role in society and how do you see that evolving?
“Art creates spaces for reflection and connection. By fostering empathy and offering new perspectives, it serves as a bridge to deeper understanding. Now more than ever, art has the capacity to bring enchantment into people’s lives. It opens minds to new ways of thinking and feeling, encouraging empathy and a deeper engagement with the world around us. As societal challenges grow, art’s ability to inspire and connect becomes increasingly important.”
Have you had any noteworthy exhibitions you'd like to share?
“Through my current participation in the traveling exhibition funded by the Alberta Foundation for the Arts, Touching the Sky, my work has reached audiences across the province. The show focuses on themes of memory and interconnection, and my contribution, No Words for Feelings, explores the emotional weight of unspoken experiences.
In addition to this, my exhibition at DORIS Space for Art was a pivotal moment in my practice. This show featured experimental works that incorporated audio elements, blending painting with sound to create a multisensory experience. By embedding audio into the artworks, I explored the interplay between linguistic resonance and visual abstraction, inviting viewers to engage with the pieces on multiple levels. This approach reflects my broader interest in how language - both visual and auditory - can deepen emotional connections and provoke layered interpretations. Through this exhibition, I was offered a grant from the Alberta Foundation for the Arts to pursue a larger more in depth research project on these themes. Having my work travel without me during TREX offered an interesting perspective on how art can resonate in spaces I haven’t physically visited. This process reinforced my belief in the power of art to create meaningful connections, even from afar. Exhibiting in both shows deepened my understanding of how art can inspire reflection and dialogue across diverse communities. It also reaffirmed my commitment to creating work that invites interpretation and engagement, offering viewers a space to connect with themselves and each other.”
Website: www.jessicahoflick.com
Instagram: @esther_hoflick
