Hannah Heaton
Artist Statement
Through the practice of painting I become more aware of the greater ecosystem, of which I am a vital part. The wavelengths of light which bounce off the terrain before transform into the kinetic energy of brushstrokes on the canvas. Opening to a state of flow invites unity and balance with the changing needs of the moment.
Plein air painting serves as my study for what becomes the final work in oil. Symbols arise from the elements from my surroundings, giving rise to a tale from the soul of my environment. In this way, I think of myself as a conduit for the messages I tune into from the natural world.
Somewhere along our evolutionary path, perhaps when agriculture was invented and the need to control the land surpassed our ability to be in balanced reciprocity with it, we created an illusion of separateness from each other and from the land. Adapting ideas from great thinkers such as Robin Wall Kimmerer, Erich Fromm and Daniel Quinn, self-destructive behaviors arise from a longing to return to our natural place within the ecosystem, rather than the unrestricted domination so common to modern practices. To numb the pain of separation we might ingest drugs, alcohol, and food, or shelter in unexamined biases. For me, the answer has been to paint.
As humans have become more disconnected from the natural world, we too often do not know the origin of materials we interact with daily: from the food we eat, to the materials in our phone, to the fibers that make up our clothing, and as artists, the mediums we use to create. Longing to reconnect in my own life and in my work, I have discovered how making my own paint from local clays, minerals and plants bridges this illusion of separateness. As I weave these earth pigments into my painting, I forge a path for greater awareness of how precious the resources are that the earth generously provides.
Accolades
Hannah has shown work in galleries throughout the southwest including Exhibit 208, Zendo, and Matrix Fine Art in Albuquerque, New Mexico, The HeArt Box in Flagstaff Arizona and Exhibizone on Biafarin's Online Exhibition. She was chosen as a distinguished artist published in Art Ascent's International Art Magazine and her work was included in the Pumphouse Pilot Program of the Fountain Hills Public Art Program.
With a background in education, from teaching middle school science in Budapest, Hungary to university level biology at the University of Washington, Hannah has started to create her own classroom through workshops on painting and dance. She has taught dozens of people how to make their own paint from clay in earth pigment paint making workshops hosted by galleries such as The HeArt Box and Exhibit 208. Over the past two years she has been facilitating a movement class that weaves together partner dancing, contact improvisation, and authentic movement. From a combination of her personal painting and dance practices she created an experiential painting workshop that she has held in various settings from Guatemala, to Arizona and New Mexico.
Hannah's most recent solo exhibition, “Deserted Embodiment" at OmniHum gallery in Taos, New Mexico was a beautiful culmination of her many offerings including mixed media visual art representation, painting and dance workshops and a closing ceremony performance art piece.
I am currently excited about opportunities to expand my work from a solo studio practice to a more community oriented approach. This includes collaborating with other artists and facilitating spaces where members of the surrounding community can come to learn, play and engage.
Some might call me an artist, an educator, or even a scientist, but I like to refer to myself as a practitioner of attunement - At the core of my work, is the longing to harmonize relationships within an ecosystem, human and more than human. The first steps towards this lofty goal involve bringing more awareness to the imbalances of these relationships, and fostering a greater sense of human responsibility for caretaking the necessary repairs.
A growing component in my process is listening. I want this practice to be woven into the many steps of my work, in honor of consciously creating. Before initiating a creative work, I find it is important to implement a meditation tuning into the internal and external worlds of that moment.
In this practice of placed based creative work, I will spend some time doing field studies in the form of plein air painting, movement sketches, plant and animal identification, or processing soil to make paint. From these materials, I allow a story to arise through my being; A visual story of the ecosystem of land in the form of mixed media visual art and accompanying movement performance.
I welcome the opportunity to involve other artists and members of the local community to participate in my field studies. I envision facilitating workshops where others can create sketches, paintings, and dance inspired by the land as well as collaborate to process materials from the land to make paint or dye fibers.
Through visual and movement arts, I will weave together the voices of local human and non-human communities, offering my work as a prayer of belonging, to each other and to the land, in honor of the history and culture of place.
From these stories it is my hope that we can glean more information about what is needed to be in more balanced reciprocity with the land and that this information can point to ways in which we can offer ourselves as a species to be better stewards of the land. The ultimate aim of my work is for our creations to bring more harmony to the ecosystems of which we are a vital part.