Richard Heinsohn -- Artist Statement
I make art which I intend as relational as opposed to demonstrative, inviting the viewer to participate in explication, and in so doing, decentering authorial intentionality. I defer to the inferential capacity of the viewer to engage and speculate on meaning because the best art experience includes some level of mystery and some sense of discovery. I often approach the human story through the lens of deep time and do this across a range of disciplines including abstract painting, wall reliefs, overpainted photos, sculpture and video. I am committed to creating works of art that maintain themselves as such while addressing existential concerns of the human experience.
Much of my work addresses the climate destruction brought about by unregulated capitalism which has proven to be an explosive catalyst for inequity, political instability, extremism and multiple forms of social injustice. This trajectory has become inevitable because my view of the world has conditioned my intuition, the engine of my compulsion to create. While responding to our complicated place in time as a civilization in turmoil, I also embrace above all else the value of an art experience wherein the work seems inexplicable or otherworldly.
One approach to understanding the climate emergency is through the consideration of deep time. Using references to geological formations, I invite viewers to consider how infinitesimal our human story is in the larger context, to look up from the grind and sense our collective vulnerabilities. In some cases, I create intricate striations as a reference to sedimentary layers and use vividly painted rocks to represent manmade transformation. In terms of deep time, I invite the observation that our entire existence has transpired within, geologically, the formation of just a few thin layers of sedimentary rock. By creating hypothetical remains from future landscapes, I ask viewers to consider time causation and consequence, to think about what we have done to our planet in the short time we’ve been here. I work with natural materials like rocks, sand, burlap and non-toxic mediums and combine them with inorganic materials like wire mesh, nuts and bolts, to create narratives about anthropogenic change to our environment. I work in a similar way with video to further convey a sense of the micro-macro, to engage viewers in the consideration of our existence as a small part of an infinite weave of patterns in time and space.
As an artist addressing inexplicability, especially of time, I celebrate unknowing as a reservoir for personal growth. I embrace notions of the sublime and the otherworldly as resources for our imaginations to transcend day-to-day routine, to stimulate the psyche. My intention is to arouse perception of our collective place in space and time so we can see our shared concerns and behave accordingly. This I convey abstractly because I want viewers to wonder about the work or to even feel astonished, keeping the art experience alive. I work this way because I believe that art that matters in the future will be that which promotes the expansion of consciousness, the inevitable course of cerebral evolution and higher understanding.