Contributed by David Humphrey / The gallery in question is Alyssa Davis Gallery, which featured Olivia Drusin’s solo show “DUMMY” from March 7 to April 19, 2026. / David Humphrey: I’m going to improvise some questions, and we’re going to go around and talk about your paintings. One of my favorite things is to look at a painting and have a conversation with it. But of course you are with me, which makes it more complicated. One of the things that interests me about painting generally is its tactile character, that the whole work was made at arm’s reach by touching the canvas over and over. You make that into a theme. If you paint a doorknob, as in Foggy Interpose, even if it’s disorientingly larger than life, it establishes a connection between looking and touching. Or the little intercom phone with buttons inside the vestibule that needs to be picked up and poked to get into the building. But a new dimension of your work in this show that’s harder to put our hands on is the atmosphere. The purple haze is a kind of affect-saturated air that is almost breathable. If touch is one form of contact, breath and taking in air is another form of intimacy. So that’s my hello to this painting.
