Julia Borden & Olivia Olsen

About Us "We want to provide a place to serve the diverse community of Mission Valley artists, sculptors, weavers, spinners, musicians, actors and dancers - a place where everybody can come together to teach, learn and share."   ~Julia Borden Olivia Lynn Olsen is the art partner in THE RED POPPY and teaches drawing and painting (acrylic, water color, as well as oil), printmaking, pyrography (wood burning) and hand building pottery.  Olivia’s specialty is in encouraging her many students, both children and adult, to think outside the lines.  One of her favorite comments is “a mark is a mark” no matter what it is made with.  She has taken classes outside to use mud puddles as paint and to find brushes from twigs, leafy branches, and even feathers and rocks.  Olivia’s own work has evolved to combine many mediums.  She is very fond of incorporating hand sculpted pottery pieces, as well as developing dimensionality, into her works.           After raising her own family, Olivia took the opportunity to go to the University of Montana, Missoula, to study art.  She graduated with a BA of Fine Art and has a teaching K-12 Art Certification.  Upon graduation, she then spent six years in Destin, Florida working with interior and exterior decorators painting murals and both Faux and sculptural finishes.  Upon her return to Montana, she continued art work in homes locally, worked for St. CharRo Florist, participated in Charlo Arts Camp, worked for the NinePipes Art Group Annual Auction, as well as THE RED POPPY.    Julia Borden is the music and business partner of THE RED POPPY and teaches violin and viola to adult students.  Born in Texas and raised in Illinois, Julia attended the University of Illinois, the New School of Music (Philadelphia), and earned a BMusic from Chapman University, in Southern California.  Her primary instrument is the viola and she has studied with Paul Rolland, Roman Totenberg, Francis Tursi, John Garvey, Max Aaronoff and Sam Taylor.         Julia has played in many community orchestras and chamber ensembles including the University of Illinois Symphony, La Camerata (Champaign-Urbana, Illinois), the Louisville Symphony, the Allentown Symphony, the Chamber Orchestra of Cambridge University (England), the California State University Dominguez Hills Symphony, the University of Nevada, Reno Symphony, and now the Missoula Symphony as well as the Helena Symphony. After raising her family, she completed a MBA and PhD in Management at UCLA.  A retired management professor, she and her husband Donn (a retired commercial pilot) moved to the Mission Valley sixyears ago from Carson City, Nevada.  She performs regularly at THE RED POPPY.