Willy Olson and Tammy Schneider grew up on farms. They both are fascinated by the western mythos, the depictions of farm life. They’ve both made plenty of art to showcase it.

Take Schneider’s “Aunt Dory,” a portrait she did using graphite of her husband’s aunt, when she was 15 years old. The girl in the picture looks dressed to ride and happy with her horse.

According to Schneider, the girl passed away not long after the photograph she used for the piece was taken.

It is pieces like “Aunt Dory” that make up “The Hayseed Artists,” an exhibition of Olson and Schneider’s work, which opens today at the Austin Area Arts Center. These pieces are also the kind of work AAAC members hope will get people back into the center and making more art to share.

“The last few years we’ve just kind of been invisible,” said Olson, this year’s AAAC president. “Honestly, the last few years we haven’t done much to make ourselves visible.”

That’s why AAAC members are making a push to reach out to more artists, whether it be more beginners’ classes for children, specialized classes for adults or simply more exhibitions like the “Hayseed Artists.”

The name was Schneider’s idea, as both artists were born and raised on farms, and both artists know what the rural life is like. They each take simple things and create beautiful works of art, like the way hayseeds blosssom from simple, small things to hay bales.

“It sounds a little corny,” Schneider said with a slight smile on her face.

Schneider, a member of the AAAC since the 1970s, prefers acrylic painting, although she also works with watercolors and graphite. She has a penchant for painting portraits, using photos she’s taken or pictures other people have provided. Not just any photo will do, however.

“I have to know and (have a) feel (for) the person,” she said.

That has provided the inspiration for several of her pieces, whether it’s a fiddler she used to know or a farmer standing in his field, looking out over his livestock, with a content smile on his face and his dog by his side. Schneider also likes to create landscape pieces and scenery art, with a majority on display at the AAAC having a country/western feel. There’s a piece with a saddle on a fence post, the only painting one AAAC member has seen that’s made a fence interesting.

Olson works in a similar way. He loves pen and pencil work, including colored pencils, anything he can pick up and use as his schedule sees fit. He works for Tandem Products in Blooming Prairie and time is precious to him.

He doesn’t simply work with country pieces, however. Olson loves to work on a variety of topics, from farmland to exotic scenery and ancient Mayan architecture.

“It keeps me interested,” Olson said on working with a variety of subjects.

It’s only the beginning of the AAAC events this summer. A reception for the artists is scheduled today between 1 and 4 p.m., with live music by Schneider and Wendy Larson, another AAAC member.

On June 11, Schneider will host an acrylics painting class from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., which is $65 to attend and participants must bring their own supplies.

There’s plenty of art to be viewed and made at the AAAC this summer.

“There’s some really wonderful art here,” Schneider said.