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Matthew Heller Tells Us We're Beautiful...
Rising star showcases new work at DCA
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DCA celebrated it's new Santa Monica gallery space with an inaugural show that featured Los Angeles’ own Matthew Heller.
A rising star on the national scene, Matthew Heller employs painting, drawing, and text to comment on life and emotional connectivity. His work is fresh and immediate in its honest depiction of relationships and inspired observation of pop culture. Masterful use of bold color and lines is often juxtaposed by his Heller's use of "deletion" as a key technique. In many places, deleted figures and text lead viewers on an emotional journey where the veiled back story is as powerful as what is revealed upon first glance.
Tree Hugger #4
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By his own declaration, passion and honesty motivate Heller's drive to
create. His figurative work embodies these virtues. As they reward the
viewer with one wry observation after another, they illuminate various
aspects of social interaction with a force and clarity rarely seen.
What’s more, his choice of deceptively simple forms encourages people
to imprint their own experiences on the canvas, enabling them to
intimately connect the art and the artist with their own lives.
True to his word, Heller never pulls his punches. Yet whether chronicling broken promises, unequal relationships, or
heroic action, he approaches his subjects (i.e. humanity) with an
overall sense of awe, admiration, and love.
On one gigantic canvas, Heller writes out what appears to be a romantic
poem in typical gray block lettering.
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Unbeknownst to the viewer, it is
in fact the entire lyrical text of an 80s power ballad, repeat choruses
and all. The effect is startling. In one fell swoop, he rescues an embarrassing kitsch relic and transforms it into something moving, inspired, and dare we say – cool. Heller may be the only living artist who can take us at our tackiest and most insipid and use the moment as a sincere affirmation of how beautiful we are. Such deft twists of personal and artistic generosity is what makes Heller's work so delicious and so sublime. Truly, this is an artist who gets it.
Arm of Passion
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• Heller 1
March 26, 2007 |
• 3 Miles of Idaho
May 1, 2007 |
• Three Mendacious Minds (more)
July 23, 2007 |
• Three Mendacious Minds
July 23, 2007 |
• Three Mendacious Minds
July 23, 2007 |
• The Makers of Weather
September 13, 2007 |
• Raw Space
November 3, 2007 |
• Raw Space - Press
November 3, 2007 |
• Matthew Heller - Art Ltd Review
November 3, 2007 |
• Matthew Heller
January 12, 2008 |
• Tony Brown
March 8, 2008 |
• Icon
April 19, 2008 |
• Live Draw! 2008
May 24, 2008 |
• John Moore
June 28, 2008 |
• DCA Workshops
July 1, 2008 |
• DCA Style
June 28, 2009 |
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