About Clare!
Clare Olson draws her power from beauty—the beauty she finds hidden deep in the mountains, the beauty in the smiles of the children she works with, and the beauty of people coming together to tell a story. As a multi-hyphenate performer based out of Seattle Washington, Clare’s joy is to bring some of that beauty to her community.
Clare Olson fell in love with the theatre as a young child, performing at her local theatre tucked between the tugboats of the coastal Maine town she grew up in. She also got her first big break at this same regional theatre as a highschooler, being hired for their summer seasons as a lead actress, dance captain, and co-camp leader for their children’s summer camp.
Carrying the ocean in her heart, she left Maine to pursue her two passions, teaching and performance, at McGill University where she majored in Elementary Education and Minored in Theatre Performance, and was selected for Myrna Wyatt Selkirk’s theatre laboratory course. Students chosen for this intensive had the honor of performing the Canadian premiere of the stage adaptation of Andri Snær Magnason’s children’s novel “The Story of the Blue Planet,” which combined Clare’s skills in performance and communicating stories to children.
After graduation, Clare pursued her dreams as an elementary school teacher out west in Olympia and Tukwila, Washington, where she shined as a writing teacher. Clare not only led workshops to help train other educators how to teach writing, she was selected for a pilot program integrating technology, specifically filmmaking, into her writing curriculum.
In her free time, she co-directed and choreographed the Disney Musicals in School, bringing performance to a whole new generation. However, the ocean kept calling, and Clare decided to leave the classroom in order to focus on her creative pursuits.
She started this new chapter by writing, starring in, and producing her first feature film, Rockweed, a magical realism adaptation of a true drama from her hometown. Rockweed is currently in post production.
When Clare isn’t creating beauty, she is celebrating it by dancing and exploring the mountains and lakes in the Pacific Northwest.
