ARTIST STATEMENT
In my art practice I confront the space where life and death meet. Through my work I offer an authentic voice for how art can serve as both a healing tool and catalyst for connection and community. I focus on color, mark making and texture as a doorway into another world.

ARTIST BIO

April Votolato, an abstract artist based in Seattle, Washington, resides with her husband, Rocky Votolato, and their French bulldog, Saint.

April’s creative journey began when she was enrolled in an art therapy program for orphans as a child. Her natural talent for poetry and portraiture propelled her to pursue her artistic interests whenever possible, balancing her studies with the responsibilities of raising a family. During this period, she attended Gage Academy of Art and the Kirkland Art Center.

In 2019, April felt a sense of disconnection from her art practice and alienated from what inspired her to create in the first place. This led Votolato to immerse herself in the study of abstract expressionism and surrealism, where she found her soul language through mixed medias, mark-making and bold colors. During this transformative period, April studied under Virginia Paquette. Virginia challenged April to examine her relationship to art and go inward to embrace a deeper connection with her process and authentic.

Ultimately, this journey would end up as a life saving practice for April after the sudden loss of her youngest child in 2021. April overtime came to understand channelling her deep anguish into her art not only was helping others but became her radical act of self-preservation that honors her child Kienan and their bond. Votolato’s unique perspective on grief and art as a process of healing, combined with her natural mixed media aesthetic skill, seamlessly weaves shapes, mark-making, and written words to create captivating emotional connections between her artwork and the viewer.

April’s paintings have been showcased at Studio 103 in Seattle, Washington, where she received the People’s Choice Award in 2023. Additionally, she was accepted into the Edmonds Art Festival Gallery in both 2023, 2024, and 2025, where she successfully sold her artwork. April has contributed art to several music albums and two poetry books. She is successful at selling her artwork in her community and online and is a full-time artist who opens her schedule to accept a selected amount of commissions yearly.