Artisan of the Month
Emily Quinn
Renaissance Painted Finishes
ERJ Murals
Elmhurst, Illinois

Emily Quinn grew up surrounded by art.  Her mother is an artist and fostered Emily’s own interest from a young age.  After graduating high school, Emily attended The School of The Art Institute of Chicago.  While at the school, she learned the techniques that would carry her through her career.  While attending the Institute, Emily says that an instructor presented her class with a daunting statistic.  “He said that in ten years only five percent of us would still be selling our art.”  She graduated in 2002, and is now well on her way to being one of the successful five percent.

After graduating, she started working her way up to full time doing mural work, and then went on to form her own company, ERJ Murals.  While she learned a lot about proper technique at The School of The Art Institute of Chicago, Emily says that they did little to prepare students for the business end of their art.  Business was something that she learned from working with others such as Bill Fisher of Renaissance Painted Finishes in Elmhurst Illinois.  Emily says of Bill “he’s successful because of how he treats people, both employees and customers.”  Emily has been working with Bill Fisher since she graduated high school in 1997 and now continues to get ninety percent of her business from working with him. 

As a mural artist, Emily works in acrylics, enamels, and oils.  These days she is also experimenting more with airbrushing techniques, and continually honing her artistic skills.  Emily says of her mural work  “you are always learning.  You can go to a lot of schools to learn, but for muralists, it’s more about teaching yourself through experience.”

Although she is working on diversifying her portfolio subject matter to include more people and portraits, Emily enjoys working with children to design their murals.  She says she likes working with children because of their energy and ideas.   She comments, “it’s a collaboration between me and the client.  I like having a lot of communication with the client.  It is satisfying to walk away from a job and know that the client is happy with the mural and the mood that it creates in the space.”

When asked about some of her favorite jobs, Emily talks about a mural that she painted for one of the former Bobak’s stores.  She accomplished the mural by working with old pictures of the family that she then worked into elements of Poland.  She also spoke of a dinosaur room that she worked on saying “It came together quickly and made a big impact.”  Emily says  “it’s fun to do a mural when the surroundings are beautifully framed out.  It’s like putting a painting in a frame.

Another thing that Emily enjoys about her mural work is that it allows her to collaborate with other artists such as Bill Fisher and Cathy Coy.  She says of this “fine art usually requires you to work alone, but mural work allows you to work with others, collaborating and feeding off of one another’s creativity.”  She says of Kathy Coy “it’s fun to watch her do her scrollwork.  It amazes me what she is able to accomplish free hand.”

Mural work allows Emily the opportunity to do many of the things that she loves.  The flexibility allows her more time to spend with her family, as well as helping her to work her love of travel into her job.  Her job has allowed her to do a lot of traveling.  While on her trips, she is constantly collecting images and subject matter to work into her murals, and enjoys learning about other cultures and how to bring them to life through her art.  Her work has also allowed her to make time for the rewarding pursuit of teaching children art at a studio in Elmhurst.

For more information about Emily Quinn and her work with Renaissance Painted Finishes and ERJ Murals please visit either renaissancepaintedfinishes.com or erjmurals.com.