Joanne Hopper
Joanne Hopper is a Maui-based painter whose work is rooted in close observation of the natural world—light, color, gesture, and the extraordinary beauty found in ordinary things. Watercolor is central to her practice, valued for its luminosity, spontaneity, and the endlessly varied ways pigments interact on paper. She also works in gouache, oil and metalpoint, painting both en plein air and in the studio.
Hopper earned her BFA in Painting with Honors from Rhode Island School of Design in 1996. Before moving to Maui, she spent more than 25 years working professionally in fine art, illustration, design and scenic painting in New York, contributing to projects for clients including Disney, Universal Studios, Radio City Music Hall, Lincoln Center and the United Nations.
Her work has been exhibited widely and received numerous honors, including a Hawaii State Foundation on Culture and the Arts purchase award and an Honorable Mention in Women in Watercolor International. In 2024, her watercolor Lahaina Banyan Light was selected for the American Watercolor Society’s 157th Annual International Exhibition at New York’s Salmagundi Club.
She lives and works on Maui, continually exploring—and sharing—the wonder revealed by really looking.