Olivia Lacey

In her new work Almost Heaven, Olivia Lacey revisits a childhood fascination with Olivia Newton-John as the roller-skating muse from Xanadu (1980).

Over the course of the residency, Lacey will develop a series of portraits of Newton-John in order to explore the intersubjective (but often one-sided) relationship between fan and idol.

Lacey’s interest in fan art stems from research into the use of romantic language in pop music and the ambiguous dialogic exchange that is often implied through the open-ended nature of love song lyrics. Like romantic language, the fan-idol relationship can be framed in terms of ideas of obsession and longing. Through this new body of drawing works, Lacey aims to examine her role as both fan and artist within this dynamic.