photo credit: Alexandra Pais, NJ.com, The Star Ledger

Theresa DeSalvio is an artist whose work is rooted in everyday life, memory and the natural world. Since moving to the Hudson Valley in 2019, many of her paintings have been inspired by life at home — cultivating her garden, canning home grown produce, making fire cider, feeding chickens, stacking wood; images of physical activities in a surrounding space that are both personal and universal.

The repetition of brushstrokes and shapes that create patterns in DeSalvio's paintings reflect the artist's thoughts about how our daily lives form patterns as they are guided by the
 time of day and the seasons.  It is this connection between visual patterns created with a paintbrush and the patterns created throughout our lives that is at the core of DeSalvio's belief that there is no separation between life and art and why her paintings speak to the resilience of the human spirit.
 
DeSalvio has explored social issues in her paintings and films.  Links to her short documentary In Treatment (Working Toward the Cure) and her internationally screened film Tales: A Cautionary Story about Heroin Addiction are in the video section of this website.  Her Film Visit to Thailand - Land of Smiles won Best Travel Film at the Tagore International Film Festival in Bengal, India and Critics Choice in Documentary, Educational and Debut Filmmaker categories.

DeSalvio has had numerous solo exhibitions including The Life and Times of The Blue Fairy, CJ Gallery Paul Robeson Galleries at Express Newark, Rutgers University; Newark, NJ; and Other Stories, Alexander Heath Contemporary, Roanoke, VA and many group exhibitions.  Her work is included in both public and private collections including The Fortune Society, Queens, NY and the Yuko Nii Collection, Brooklyn, NY.

In 2023, DeSalvio published her first Children's Book, Mama Loon and Mister Dale.   

DeSalvio holds a MFA from CUNY Hunter College (1982) and a BFA from the School of Visual Arts (1976).