Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Ellen Hackl Fagan. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Ellen, thanks for joining us today. One of our favorite things to hear about is stories around the nicest thing someone has done for someone else – what’s the nicest thing someone has ever done for you?

The kindest thing anyone has ever done for me in my profession was having an artist on staff at the Discovery Museum in Bridgeport, Connecticut fight for my work to be included in a historic exhibition, Color, Contrasts and Cultures, in 1996. This artist made sure to recommend my work for this show, and continued to push to keep it included. The painting hung adjacent to illustrious Colorists like Ellsworth Kelly, Sonya Delauney, Josef Albers, Carmen Herrera, and Byron Kim.

Ellen, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I was born an artist. I was the kid in first grade that everyone asked to draw their horses and people. Art and making pictures is in my blood. I am primarily a painter but I also am an arts industry leader with a thriving curatorial practice. I put together exhibitions and am often asked to jury large exhibitions predominantly in New York City and Connecticut. I am also developing inroads in the Midwest with colleagues that I am meeting there.

I believe that the thing that sets me apart from other curators is that I am a practicing artist. This means that my exhibitions fall together with a singular eye for color, theory, history, concept, and composition. When composing an exhibition in a space, for me, it’s like I am putting together a larger painting, with more moving parts.

My paintings and studio practice continue to integrate into my curation. Themes for exhibitions often spring from concepts and surface details I am working on in my paintings. This helps expand the ways artists work with my ideas, and creates a more open dialogue about the very questions I am trying to solve in my own work.

I think the main thing that clients and followers should understand about my creative approach is that I believe the artwork needs to remain fluid, free from compartmentalization, open to randomness. This gives me future problems that might emerge in the materials and the results of experimentation in paint, installation, collaboration, and language.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

I started my business in 1982, pre-home computer, pre-social media, pre-digital photography, pre-internet. It’s impossible to envision this earlier time, but it was a time of published reviews, printed announcement cards for exhibitions, mass mailings from galleries, and 35 mm color slide submissions with typed pages for proposals.

This process gave me excellent training but is no longer relevant to the process of self-promotion and inclusion.

It was also a time when motherhood was considered a hindrance to a woman artist’s career.

As an ambitious artist, I plugged away at building my resume, while beginning a marriage and family.

In 1996, my husband lost his life to a fast moving cancer, and I began the life of the single mother, with three young sons to raise. This created a real obstacle for engaging in the social art world, and the opportunities for exhibitions and connections that could foster my career’s growth were slowed down significantly.

The karmic lesson I was handed was patience. This is not a lesson people ask for, rather, it’s imposed on one.

As I worked through those years of parenting as my priority, I did, in time get a graduate degree in painting in my 40s, and continued to exhibit my work, while the New York City art world beckoned at a distance.

This focus on family, and the lesson of patience, did help me build lifelong organizational skills and a deep love of music and philosophy, both of which feed my creative life.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

The primary mission driving my creative journey is to stay open to new ideas and communities that enter my life. This includes staying open to shifts in my work, both as a curator and as an artist. Embracing change, and the risks that come with it, keeps my work alive. Bringing in new disciplines invites new collaborations and conversations with experts in their chosen fields. Saying YES to ideas that others bring to the table, opens up new, unexpected pathways for my profession to grow.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.ehfaganstudio.com and www.odettagallery.com
• Instagram: @ehfaganstudio. and. @odettagallery

Image Credits

Photo Credits:
1) Personal Photo: FEVER SONGS, John Morton, Composer and Interactive Media Designer and Ellen Hackl Fagan, Paintings. Bronx Art Space, Bronx, NY Sabine Schumacher, Curator. Photo: Courtesy of Ellen Hackl Fagan, 2019. Installation documentation.
2) CIRCLES AND ELLIPSES, Space 776, New York City, Spring 2023. Curated by Ellen Hackl Fagan, Photo: Courtesy of Ellen Hackl Fagan, 2023. Installation documentation.
3) Seeking the Sound of Cobalt Blue_Beach Walk, acrylic on museum board, 108 x 60 inches. Copyright 2018 Ellen Hackl Fagan, all rights reserved. Photo: Courtesy of Ellen Hackl Fagan.
4) GHOST TOWN Artist’s Talk, New York Artist’s Equity Gallery, New York City. Spring 2024. Curated by Ellen Hackl Fagan, Photo: Courtesy of Ellen Hackl Fagan, 2024.
5) LUST FOR RUST, Atlantic Gallery, New York City. Winter 2025.Curated by Ellen Hackl Fagan, Photo: Courtesy of Ellen Hackl Fagan, 2025. Installation documentation.
6) PAINTING BY PROXY, Project Art Space, New York City, Winter 2022. Curated by Joan Grubin. Ellen Hackl Fagan, Seeking the Sound of Cobalt Blue_Big Blue and Beach Walk, acrylic on museum board, 108 x 60 inches, 2018 – 2020. Copyright 2018 -2020 Ellen Hackl Fagan, all rights reserved. Photo: Courtesy of Ellen Hackl Fagan. Installation documentation.