[Sponsored] Jan Heaton’s “CALM | A JOURNEY” at Davis Gallery, Austin

Over the past two years, we’ve seen artists adjust their practices in many different ways. Some have gone in completely new directions; others have been more productive than ever; while others have used this pandemic time as a period of quiet, contemplative reflection. 

Jan Heaton, the Austin-based artist who, next week, is opening her exhibition CALM | A JOURNEY at Davis Gallery, has used the past two years to redefine her practice. Her first solo exhibition in a number of years, the show is a reemergence for Heaton; it’s a collection of pieces — some older, but many created in 2021 and 2022— that for her marks a return, a sort of “re-launching” of her career (as if it ever stopped).

The newer pieces in the show are inspired by Heaton’s recent two-year stint living in Laguna Beach. While she spent the majority of her time there caring for her daughter who was undergoing cancer treatment, she also made smaller-scale pieces in her bedroom. The artist focused, she said, on painting things that made her feel tranquil and brought her to a quiet, meditative place. Throughout this period, she wasn’t thinking about the merits of exhibiting or showing these works; she was making them for herself. 

During the months since, she’s taken these small pieces and considered how to make them monumental. Her choice of materials is pointed and focused: she’s been a longtime lover of the texture and personalities of different papers, elements that are particularly conducive to her chosen medium of watercolor. The paper substrate also lends itself to easy rethinking and editing — if needed, the works can be torn and cropped down to their best selves.

In this way, too, Heaton is a pluralist. Rather than working in fast-drying acrylic or ever-wet oil, she uses a medium that makes her, at least momentarily, pause and think. This means she has many different pieces in the works at the same time, which gives her the ability to consider each composition individually.

Her eye is partly inherited: Heaton was raised in Detroit, where her mother worked as an illustrator at General Motors during World War II. Heaton describes her as a “modern-day da Vinci,” saying that she could do anything from reupholstering a sofa to fixing a toaster to making sculptures and paintings using any medium. Her father was also creative: he was a sign painter who continuously worked on projects in the family home’s basement. It was here that he taught Heaton basic brush handling, as well as brush lettering and calligraphy.

After bouncing between Del Rio, Detroit, and Austin, Heaton finally settled in 1976 into her new Central Texas home. This is when the artist was able to further hone her sensibilities. She spent twenty years in advertising, breaking into the industry on the merit of her illustration and calligraphy work. As she moved up and learned more throughout her career, she came to recognize the importance of spacial relationships among images and objects. This insight gave her the unique ability to see her artwork outside of herself — or, to experience it fresh, as her audience does.

In CALM | A JOURNEY, Heaton is operating under the thesis that large artworks are liberating. The pieces are awash in saturated colors, which either overlap to create unique washes, or stand on their own, forming rhythmic patterns. If you viscerally respond to these pieces, then you get it — that’s the idea! With their swirling lines and bright colors, they’re meant to elicit an emotional response — one particularly of release and joy. Although the past few years have been difficult — both for the wider world and for Heaton — the artist says that she’s unable to make mournful art. Instead, she had to find a way to use her work to break through personal strife and come out on the other side. In a way, it is art therapy made public, with the hope that, if you’re seeing it, you can relate. 

While many of the works in the show lean towards abstraction, some of the pieces do hint at figuration. Heaton has an appreciation for the overlooked — the small, natural details that are so easy to miss, but in themselves so elegant. Flora and other detritus abound, framing negative space on the picture planes. In a paired-down sense, Heaton is looking at how a landscape can be reduced to lines. For her works, she creates the notions of objects while obscuring their real forms, allowing us, her viewers, to focus on their details.

Since Heaton has made art making her full-time job, people have taken note; she’s had solo exhibitions at Wally Workman Gallery and the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin, and The Hunt Gallery in San Antonio. She’s also seen some success in having her work acquired by medical centers in Texas and beyond, which are, though widely viewed, perhaps under the radar but important collectors of art.

This pairing, particularly, makes sense: Heaton’s churning mandalas and layered colorscapes are centering. The repetitive process of her marks has a calming effect, which allows you to get lost in the swirling, radiant surfaces she lays down on paper. They’re complex while remaining accessible — you can bring your own experiences to her works through any entry point.

Heaton’s bold pieces help argue for the value of “the beautiful” in art. They claim that indulgence and escape can be the point — alone, the works’ appeal is enough. If we embrace musicians for writing timeless love songs, so too should we welcome an artist whose work professes a joyous appreciation of life.

 

Jan Heaton: CALM | A JOURNEY will be on view at Davis Gallery in Austin from April 23 through May 28, 2022. Learn more by visiting Davis Gallery’s website.