Colleen Heineman

I have recently had a revelation, a realization of what I love and of what I want to make art about. It has always been there, struggling to find a voice, or a fountainhead to spew from. This revelation came from the question: What do I find fascinating? My fascination with texture, geology, and organic forms has always been a constant in my life. Simple. Texture fascinates me. This I have always known. My most vivid memories are not necessarily visual scenes, but the feeling of the environment: the stiff netting on a dress, the itch of an acrylic scarf, the cool feeling of the couch upholstery in the A.C. on a hot summer day. The study of the earth fascinates me. It is, though, a fairly recent admitted fascination. I have always been intrigued by the mass movement of the earth, as well as by the interaction of land and weather. It was not until I had the chance to study the earth in the desert mountains of the Four Corners Region of the U.S. (Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico) that this intrigue built up to borderline obsessive observations of the earth. I believe that my fascination began purely through the observations, wonderings, and interaction with the earth, directly, the soil, water, sand: seeing the layers of limestone meet the layer of shale in the side of a road cut, digging in the backyard, realizing that the sand running through your fingers can happen on the ocean side as well as by a river as well as in the middle of an arid desert. I choose to try to communicate these fascinations with geology and texture in my metal work and drawings. When working with metal, I find that I want to transform metal into soft organic shapes and textures. The smooth cod feel of a lone piece of metal warms in ones hand and becomes a part of the individual. This interaction with the wearer and the piece is guided by comfort and intrigue, my intrigue being the texture and shape. In drawing I find communicating the visual landscape of the earth much more fluid. The observations of topography and landscape are apparent in the subject matter, as well as in the repetitive line. I feel that the imagery becomes more interesting when it is smaller in scale, with the many lines and textures evoking curiosity in the viewer. Using graphite or ink, these layers grow as the depth of the scene grows. The narrative of the landscape needs to be communicated, in its energy or in its silence. The textures and patterns of the earth intrigue and inspire me. The overwhelming theme in all of these observations is present in the processes through which sand on the ocean side becomes stone, by the process by which pressure creates and morphs the rock in the road cut. It is the theme of rebirth, and re-growth. These layers build and wash away, compress and renew in the earth, exploding, to begin again in a burst of energy.

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