Artist: Heidi Brueckner; Artwork: Cigar and Nails in Havana, First place winner mixed media Jan 2021 edition.
Artist: Heidi Brueckner
Country: United States
Email: heidi.brueckner@wvm.edu
Website: heidibrueckner.com
Biography:
Heidi Brueckner is a Professor of Art at West Valley College in Saratoga, California where she has taught painting, drawing, and design for over 20 years.
A native Californian, Brueckner studied at the University of Heidelberg and The Goethe Institute in Germany in the late 1980s. During this pivotal year, she was able to visit the major museums of Europe and found herself heavily influenced artistically by 20th century German art.
Brueckner received a BA in Fine Art and a BA in Art History from University of California, Santa Cruz in 1991. She received an MFA in Painting from University of Kansas in 1997.
Professor Brueckner’s work has been shown at museums, galleries, colleges, and in publications nationally and internationally. She has received several awards and scholarships for her work.
In 2018, she published the book “Monsterbet”, a series of 26 oil, acrylic, and mixed media paintings based on the format of children’s alphabet rhymes. The book is available for purchase at Etsy, Amazon, and at her website heidibrueckner.com.
Most recently, she was awarded 1st Place in the international Italian art competition, Prisma Art Prize. Upcoming solo exhibitions will be at GearBox Gallery in Oakland, California in 2021, and at Buckham Gallery in Flint, Michigan in 2022.
She currently lives and makes art in Oakland, California.
Statement:
My portraits are meant to evoke intimate and individualistic narratives, and often include a layer of social commentary. The compositions are often frontal, discomforting, and intrusive. I revel in playing with bright color and pattern, tilted and flattened space, and distorted form in order to achieve psychological expression and visual activity, but also to create an element of humor and fun.
I have been working exclusively on portraiture since the global health crisis because time with friends & loved ones is precious or limited and the calling to capture them through the ritual of portraiture has been strong. Additionally, since it is no longer safe to travel, it has become increasingly important for me to include people I have met through traveling in this series. The series has enabled me to think intensely about people I know or have known. The creation process has been a different way of spending time with, or “seeing”, people and I have found it to be quite rewarding and personally important.
Artwork : Cigar and Nails in Havana
Medium: Oil on Recycled Bubble Wrap, Tissue, & Paper Bags
Dimensions: 48″ x 36″
