Traci O’Very Covey was born in Salt Lake City and received a Bachelor of  Fine Arts from the University of Utah in 1983. She has been an award-winning graphic designer and illustrator for the past 23 years. Her work has been featured in national design publications and she is illustrator and designer of several books. Traci’s years as a communication artist have influenced her fine art with a keen sense of composition and use of color. She communicates an essence or narrative by overlapping compositional elements that often unite with a central figure.

Traci has illustrated the promotional images for the Utah Opera these past four years and has enjoyed the challenge of portraying the symbolism of each operatic story line in a single painting.

She and husband Mikel Covey, photographer and digital artist, are partners in O’Very/Covey, a creative communications firm serving both local and national clients.

Traci enjoys working in a variety of media, from ink, gouache and acrylic to digital pen. Her use of color, shape, and confident brush strokes give her paintings an energetic, lyrical and sophisticated quality.

Her paintings have been exhibited in galleries, auctions and are in private collections.

My recent paintings are images of reverence, reflection and divine contemplation of the spirit in all things. They portray a meditative expression, a yen for the yin side of life and a quiet simplicity. I find inspiration for my paintings in allegory and symbology and also in the power of gentleness. Also, I may be reflecting some innate memory of our mythological pastoral past. I am intrigued by the idea of representing nature as human in spirit and also in the Greek concept of a goddess Muse inspiring or motivating an artist.

I am painting with acrylic on plywood for this series and leaving the wood grain revealed in areas. These peaceful, mostly female images, contrast with the rough, brushed and scraped surface of the wood, imparting a raw emotional quality.

My paintings in gouache are a further exploration of this theme and allow me to express the symbolism of my subject through an interweaving of design, color and shape.