ARTIST STATEMENT
I am an interdisciplinary artist. I work primarily in mixed media painting using photography and encaustic. My art is content driven and explores concepts of fertility, our relationship with the common vital life force in all living things, and the edge where life meets death. My artwork often references nude studies, architecture, transparent forms, fertility symbols, and found objects. As evidence of one of nature’s most dramatic expressions of our planet’s life cycle, nests and eggs are especially present in my work. Current works have centered around how we internally carry our life force with us. This has led me to paint with encaustic onto translucent surfaces and illuminate the works from inside or behind the pieces.
My artwork is narrative, gaining much of my creative inspiration from within myself. Introspective issues are explored, encouraging the viewer to be transformed to another place and time. For me, art becomes a personal religion, crossing lines between traditional art, other disciplines, and my connection to Spirit. My art feels as though it is channeled through my body. As a conduit, I often feel as if Spirit is directing my hands. My mind then follows, reading the story my hands tell.
BIO
Heidi Beal received her Bachelor of Arts with a degree in interdisciplinary studies from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio (1985) with additional graduate studies at California College of the Arts in Oakland, California (1985-1987). Heidi splits her time between the mountains of Springville and the sea of Ventura California. She is fond of traveling the countryside on creative, eclectic adventures, showing her work regularly, and teaching encaustic painting.
Heidi’s personal mission is to create spaces that cultivate personal creative expression, a sense of home, and community through the arts. She and her husband are the co-founders of Constellation Farms and Retreat Center, providing fulfilling work and community to people with developmental disabilities. Under her direction, she has created a social recreation program where adults with I/DD can come together and creatively express themselves, socialize, cook, garden, and most importantly, build community.