Mary Heilmann

Looking at Pictures

  • Mary Heilmann painting Crashing Wave

    Mary Heilmann, Crashing Wave, 2011 (detail), Oil on canvas, 127 x 101.60 cm, © Mary Heilmann, Photo: Thomas Müller, Courtesy of the artist, 303 Gallery, New York, and Hauser & Wirth

Past Exhibition


This exhibition was on 8 Jun – 21 Aug 2016

Exhibition
Mary Heilmann: Looking at Pictures

8 June – 21 August 2016

Be captivated by colour: 4 starsEvening Standard
Prepare to be dazzled – Time Out
A wonderfully rich survey – It’s Nice That

The surreal beach life of Los Angeles, 1960s counter culture, pop songs and friendships with New York artists, poets and musicians are the well springs of Mary Heilmann’s dazzling abstractions.

Heilmann (b. 1940) takes colour, line and shape on unexpected journeys. Polka dots waft across eye-popping hues corralled within irregular rectangles. The poetry of her works lies in the tension between the rigours of geometry and the contingencies of the human and the organic.

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The exhibition begins with paintings based on the square, the grid and architectural details, such as The First Vent (1972). They are juxtaposed with glazed ceramics, hovering between painting and sculpture. A slide show, Her Life (2006), features Heilmann’s paintings and personal photographs set to an eclectic mix of music.

Choreographed across Gallery 8, dynamic canvases represent ‘autobiographical markers’ – painterly haikus of the artist’s life. Their vibrancy is matched by their titles – Bush of Ghosts (1980) or Good Vibrations Diptych, Remembering David (2012). Heilmann invites the viewer to become immersed in her synaesthetic stories while sitting in her colourful chairs.


This exhibition is generously supported by The Robert Lehman Foundation and those who wish to remain anonymous.


Mary Heilmann at the Whitechapel Gallery - Exhibition catalogue

Catalogue

This fully illustrated exhibition catalogue features new writings by Mary HeilmannLydia Yee and Briony Fer. Price: £28.00.

 

Mary Heilmann installation shot at Whitechapel Gallery 2016

Events

See the full programme of talks, events and performances coinciding with Mary Heilmann: Looking at Pictures.

Artist Mary Heilmann sitting in her exhibition at Whitechapel Gallery

Blog: The Playlist

Step into Mary Heilmann‘s record collection with a selection of tracks from the 60s, 70s and 80s.

Mary Heilmann Chair, Pink - Whitechapel Gallery Limited Editions

Limited Editions

Buy art by leading contemporary artists exclusively at the Whitechapel Gallery.

Find out more

Read the press release