Interview
Jesseca Zollars Smith
Jesse, (as friends and family call her) paints the kind of moments most people miss ~ the drool on a baby’s chin or the space between breaths. Born beneath the gray skies of the Pacific Northwest, she grew up with a quiet ache in her chest~ a silent reverberation that still echoes through her work, drawing in the seeker, evoking the question: What have I forgotten to feel? Her portraits are less about likeness and more about presence. Each piece is an invitation to remember~ someone, someplace, some version of ourselves that still lives just beneath the surface. She apprenticed under a classically trained artist from Poland while in Olympia, WA, where she absorbed Impressionist techniques and elaborate methods that expanded her craft and deepened her reverence for light, color, and storytelling on canvas. Over the years, Jesseca has been a featured artist at the Olympia Garden Club Tours, the Olympia Arts Walk, neighborhood showcases across Western Washington, and the Wimberley Valley Art League. She has painted live at private events and completed portrait commissions for clients near and far—always with a deep reverence for story and soul.
What is your background and how did you start your journey in the art world?
“I actually began my creative life showing work and participating in art shows, and from a very young age I was always drawing. Art was my first language. I was awarded a scholarship to the Art Institute, but ultimately chose not to go. A decision that led me down a more self-directed and unconventional path. Over time, that path expanded into entrepreneurship, where I spent many years building and running a business. Even then, art never left. I continued to draw, paint and explore ideas privately, allowing my relationship with art to evolve without formal constraints. That long period of working, observing and living outside of the traditional art world deeply shaped how I approach my practice today. What I’m doing now feels like a return, rather than a departure… a continuation of something that’s always been present. My work reflects a lifetime of drawing, making, pausing and coming back again informed as much by lived experience as by early creative instinct.”
What inspires you?
“I’m inspired by quiet moments and the emotional weight of place such as landscapes that hold memory, weather, distance and time. I’m drawn to the beauty of children’s faces and the challenge to reflect back the amazing energy and light they hold. I’m drawn to spaces where things soften or blur: mist, horizon lines, transitions between light and dark. These moments feel honest to me, like pauses where reflection happens naturally.”
What themes do you pursue? Is there an underlying message in your work?
“I work primarily in landscapes and portraits, and wile they may appear different on the surface, they’re driven by the same themes. Both explore stillness, presence and the emotional space between what is seen and what is felt. In my landscapes, I’m drawn to atmosphere, distance and transition, places where light softens, forms dissolve and time feels suspended, almost as if in a dreamscape. My portraits approach those same ideas through the human form. Rather than focusing on likeness alone, I’m interested in mood, vulnerability and what’s carried beneath the surface. The figures often feel contemplative inward, mirroring the sense of pause and reflection found in my landscapes. At the core of my work is an invitation to slow down and notice, to sit with ambiguity, softness, and emotional truth. Whether I’m painting a place or a person, the underlying message is the same: there is depth and meaning in stillness and beauty in what remains unspoken.”
How would you describe your work?
“My work blends impressionist techniques with realism, balancing atmospheric looseness with moments of clarity and form. I’m interested in the space where suggestion meets structure; where brushwork remains visible, yet the subject still feels grounded and present.”
Which artists influence you most?
“My work blends impressionist techniques with realism, influenced by artists such as Gaugin and Degas. I focus on expressive brushwork, emotional presence and atmosphere allowing both portraits and landscapes to convey depth beyond surface detail.”
What is your creative process like?
“My creative process is intuitive, physical and non linear. I tend to work on multiple paintings at once, allowing ideas to move back and forth between pieces. This often results in a lively somewhat chaotic studio environment-but that energy is part of how the work evolves. I rarely finish a painting in one sitting. Some pieces sit for weeks or even months before they resolve, while others come together rapidly once the creative flow clicks in. I trust that rhythm rather than forcing completion. Stepping away and returning later often brings clarity, allowing the work to finish itself when it’s ready. The process is guided by instinct and momentum rather than a strict plan. I respond to color, mood, and movement as they emerge letting each painting find it’s own timing. Ultimately the work is completed when it feels settled and when the energy quiets and nothing more needs to be added.”
What is an artist’s role in society and how do you see that evolving?
“I believe an artist’s role in society, is to bear witness, to slow things down and to reflect back what it feels like to be human in a particular moment in time. Art has the ability to hold emotion, memory and nuance in ways that words often can’t. It offers space for contemplation, connection, empathy, especially in a world that moves incredibly fast. As society evolves, I see the artist’s role becoming even more essential. With so much noise and ‘surface-level’ imagery, artists can offer depth still touched by actual hands as opposed to AI. For me, evolution means staying honest and allowing the work to grow alongside lived experience while remaining rooted in actualized truth. I see art not as something that provides answers, but as something that opens space for questions.”
Have you had any noteworthy exhibitions you'd like to share?
“I participated in early local art shows before shifting into entrepreneurship. I’m currently focused on developing a cohesive body of work and preparing for future exhibitions.”
