Andrea Joyce Heimer’s largely biographical acrylic and oil pastel paintings will be on exhibit in “Holy Mountain,” many for the first time, at the Whatcom Museum’s Lightcatcher building, Sept. 10, 2022 through Jan. 8, 2023. Based in Whatcom County, Heimer’s work has gained national attention and has been shown in galleries, exhibitions and art fairs throughout the country.
Over the course of the pandemic Heimer spent many hours in nature—as much as she once did in childhood. Having grown up in Montana, she is familiar with land that stretches out in all directions under a big sky and where pine covered mountains skirt brutally desolate badlands.
The Montana landscape is omnipresent in her densely populated, story-filled paintings. Each mountain, stream, prairie and butte are as much characters in the work as the human figures that teem within.
Though Heimer often reflects on her childhood experiences in Montana, viewers will recognize Mt. Baker, Racehorse Falls and other isolated locales around Western Washington that the artist explores these days.
The Museum will present 17 of Heimer’s paintings, in which symbolic figures navigate wild terrains with varying degrees of success. The paintings are paired with lengthy titles hand-written on the walls by Heimer herself, giving a confessional peek into her sweeping visual narratives.
Curator of Art Amy Chaloupka, who has worked with Heimer a few times over her career says, “Heimer has an incredible ability to fill her scenes with so much activity and information, while working within the confines of a uniquely flattened picture plane. Her layered processes of combining hand painted brush strokes, precisely stenciled elements and detailed hand drawn pattern-work, makes her figures appear fully entwined with their surroundings. Her storylines are both deeply personal yet speak to universal themes of connection and loneliness and a search for self.”
Heimer received her MFA from the New Hampshire Institute of Art in Manchester, New Hampshire. Her work has been exhibited at Nicelle Beauchene Gallery, New York; Colombo Gallery, Milan; CG2 Gallery, Nashville; Linda Hodges Gallery, Seattle; Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art, Philadelphia; Andrew Edlin Gallery, New York and Franklin Parrasch Gallery, New York. Her work has also been covered in media outlets including The Wall Street Journal, Art in America, The New York Times, The New Yorker, New American Paintings, and Huffington Post. She is represented by Nino Mier Gallery in Los Angeles, Calif.
About the Whatcom Museum:
The Whatcom Museum in Bellingham, Wash., offers a variety of exhibitions, programs, tours and activities about art, nature and Northwest history for all ages. Its multi-building campus is in the heart of Bellingham's downtown Arts District. The Lightcatcher building, 250 Flora St., and Old City Hall, 121 Prospect St., are open Thursdays – Sundays, Noon – 5 PM. For more information about our exhibitions and admission visit www.whatcommuseum.org.
The Whatcom Museum acknowledges that we gather on the traditional territory of the Lhaq’temish – Lummi People – and the Nuxwsá7aq – Nooksack People – who have lived in the Coast Salish region from time immemorial. The Museum honors our relationship with all of our Coast Salish neighbors and our shared responsibilities to their homeland where we all reside today.
