Louis Buhl & Co. is pleased to present a solo exhibition with Heather Day, titled Night Crackle, opening Saturday, July 9th, 2022. Day’s abstract works draw the viewer through atmospheric shifts of color and map-like etchings. Pools of pigment flood across canvases forming layers of stitched contours beneath a lexicon of gestural mark making.
Within the rhythm of repetition and the body’s own limitations, Day’s method of painting explores the relationship between control and chance as she exercises muscle memory to examine the evolution of a mark when it is replicated over and over again. Working with washes on canvas, Day approaches each painting with a great level of preparation: after determining measurements of medium and pigment, she times each application of paint to the canvas, all while paying mind to the elements of her surrounding environment, such as time of day or humidity level, and how those factors can impact her outcome. Even with this structured system, a component of chaos is introduced once the wash hits the canvas, Day’s governance lost as the marks shift and grow to take on forms of their own discovery. Once complete, Day’s painted canvases are dissected and fastened together, propagated and regrown, uncovering the modes that echo between them.
The ideas of challenging perception and sorting through memories are constant sources in Day’s conceptual well, rooted in myriad cultural shifts, languages and international migrations she experienced growing up. Born in Hawaii, Day has lived across the globe—Japan, Washington D.C., Chicago, Baltimore, San Francisco—before most recently moving to Joshua Tree where she currently resides. Living in her new desert home, Day has become acutely aware of the outdoor environment and the role it plays in her practice: both physically when it comes to factors of production, and aesthetically as its influence pertains to visual elements. The featured paintings embody “that last burst of color” in the sky right after or during sunset, most readily apparent through the moody red and crisp blue color palettes that imbue them. They are characterized by full bleeds of color with a lack of negative space. Since moving to Joshua Tree, Day has felt a sheer immersion in her new community; with the show’s paintings being the first collective body of work she has created in the desert, it was important to the artist that they were drenched in that same energy.
Complementing the paintings is a series of monoprints Day produced with Farrington Press, located in Southern California’s High Desert. Over the course of a few months, she worked closely with master printer Kyle Simon at the off-grid, solar powered mountain print shop to employ various techniques in the creation of the work. Day composed her paintings on cherry wood and steel matrices, which were then printed onto Saunders Waterford paper using 200 tons of pressure (about half the amount of pressure used to create a diamond). Similar to Day’s paintings, many of the prints were dissected and re-assembled using bookbinding techniques to build new compositions, the final result existing as multiple works within one.
Heather Day: Night Crackle is on view from July 9th through August 24, 2022.
Paintings
Heather Day — Night Crackle No. 1
Mixed media on stitched canvas
36 x 48 inches
Heather Day — Night Crackle No. 2
Mixed media on stitched canvas
36 x 48 inches
Heather Day — Night Crackle No. 3
Mixed media on stitched canvas
50 x 58 inches
Heather Day — Night Crackle No. 4
Mixed media on stitched canvas
55.5 x 47.5 inches
Heather Day — Last Light No. 1
Mixed media on stitched canvas
30 x 22 inches
Heather Day — Last Light No. 2
Mixed media on stitched canvas
30 x 22 inches
Monoprints
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 4
Monoprint made from wood and steel matrix, with inlaid monoprint element. Deckled and signed by the artist. Framed in white. 1/1
Artwork: 39h x 29w inches
Framed: 43.625h x 33.625w inches
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 1
Monoprints from wood block matrix, spliced together using bookbinders tape on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 2
Monoprints from wood block matrix, spliced together using bookbinders tape on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 3
Monoprints from wood block and steel matricies, spliced together using bookbinders tape on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 5
Monoprints from wood block and steel matricies, inlaid with monoprint element on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 6
Monoprints from wood block and steel matricies, inlaid with monoprint element on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 7
Monoprint from wood and steel matricies on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 8
Monoprint from wood and steel matricies on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 9
Monoprint from wood and steel matricies on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 10
Monoprint from cherry woodblock matrix on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 11
Monoprint from cherry woodblock matrix on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique
Heather Day — Occluded Fronts No. 12
Monoprint from cherry woodblock matrix on Saunders Waterford Hot Press Paper. Deckled and signed by the artist.
39h x 29w in
1/1 or unique