The Shapes Have Stories
In Beatriz Olson’s solo show at City Gallery
By Brian Slattery, New Haven Independent (February 2026)
Artist Beatriz Olson pointed to an abstract painting, a series of friendly shapes on a field of blue. "That's my self-portrait," she said, noting that it was the second one she'd made. Her first one, made years earlier, centered on "me as a little girl." She used her passport picture from when she emigrated from Cuba, "and I put myself behind a grate," as if in jail.
"But this now is me," she said, gesturing to the bright canvas. "That's my stethoscope. I'm sensing the world from a very personal, very deep, centered space where I really want to be present ... and just give life to everything around me."