How the BYU Alum Turned Her Passion for Patterns Into a Professional Art Career While Raising a Young Family.
Paige Crosland Anderson always knew she wanted to be an artist. Long before she declared a major at Brigham Young University, Anderson loved to paint and draw. With both grandfathers serving as professors at BYU — one in theatre, the other in math — she grew up surrounded by art creators and appreciators. Even her math professor grandfather was a devoted art collector. In Anderson’s home, the arts were never seen as impractical, but as viable career paths.
As a freshman, Anderson was accepted into BYU’s art program. Yet, like many aspiring artists, she briefly questioned whether art was a realistic career. A well-meaning friend’s father suggested industrial design, graphic design or architecture — paths he called more practical.
“I thought about it,” Anderson said, “but those programs never excited me — art did.”
With the encouragement of her parents, Anderson chose to pursue her passion as an artist. Looking back, she says that support was essential to her confidence and future career.
“I feel really lucky that my family’s influence made me feel like the arts were very much a viable career,” Anderson said.
Anderson’s final year at BYU looked different than many of her peers’. While some classmates prepared to enter top-tier graduate programs, Anderson was preparing for motherhood. She had her senior show in December 2010, welcomed her baby in February and graduated in April.
Soon after graduating, Anderson moved to Bologna, Italy, for her husband’s graduate program. She had brought her paints but was not creating consistently until her husband encouraged her, stating, “You need to be making something. It makes you a happier person.”
Despite not speaking Italian, they found an art supply store, and in what she calls an “art Mecca,” Anderson returned to her first love: patterns.
Her senior project had used beeswax hexagons to represent 20 generations of ancestors. Even in Italy, surrounded by centuries of masterpieces, she felt drawn to patterns — rows of windows, mosaic tile floors.
While raising a small child in a new culture, she began painting again. “I had never totally stopped,” Anderson said. “So, when opportunities came, I was ready.”
After moving to Washington, D.C., and later Salt Lake City, Anderson continued to paint, using her small apartment balcony as a studio. When her second baby was six weeks old, a woman who had seen one of her paintings called, requesting a same-day studio visit. Despite the chaos of two small children, Anderson said yes.
The woman stayed for hours and loved Anderson’s paintings so much that she offered Anderson a featured show at Communal, a restaurant in downtown Provo. At Communal, Anderson’s work caught the eye of gallery owner Susan Meyer. Since 2013, Anderson has exhibited at Meyer Gallery in Park City, in a partnership that helped legitimize her as an artist and expand her reach.
“When you are in a gallery, all of a sudden people are willing to pay your prices,” Anderson said. “Suddenly, I had more credibility, and my studio practice has only grown since then.”
Anderson credits much of her career readiness to BYU’s College of Fine Arts and Communications. In the Department of Art, she learned how to photograph her work, build a website and price paintings. Professors connected her with framers and shipping contacts she still works with.
“It was a program that asked, ‘What do you want to do?’ and then helped you get there,” she said.
The network she built while at BYU — professors, peers and industry contacts — was foundational to her success and opened unique opportunities.
Today, Anderson continues to balance her studio practice with motherhood. To her, the flexibility to adapt her career to life’s demands is one of the greatest blessings of her degree.
“I am my own boss. When life gets busy, I can ramp down. When I have more capacity, I can ramp back up,” she said. “Art has been a great career to merge with motherhood.”
In addition to displaying her work in Meyer Gallery, Anderson frequently uses her skills to serve her community, from school fundraisers to church projects. She believes that because there are fewer artists in the world, she has a greater opportunity to give back to her community in unique, meaningful ways.
Currently, Anderson is caring for her two-month-old baby while exploring new projects such as mini altar pieces.
Like the patterns she paints, her career follows a rhythm. Anderson credits CFAC for developing her ability to create, adapt and grow. She hopes current CFAC students recognize the lasting value of their education.
“My education has been such a foundational blessing,” she said. “I hope CFAC students are soaking it up, because it will serve them for the rest of their lives.”