Heather Day is an artist based in California.

 

It Went Like This 

56'' X 72'', ACRYLIC, spray paint, soft pastel and charcoal ON canvas, 2019

ON VIEW AT JOSHUA LINER GALLERY, NYC

 

UICA

A MURAL CREATED FOR the urban institute for contemporary art in Grand Rapids, mi

 

JOURNAL

 
Saturday is the last day to see ‘Pour’ @joshualinergallery in New York- a two person show with my paintings alongside the powerful work of @kathrynmac. 💫 “Pour explores a dynamic approach to painting, characterized by the pouring and pushing of paint on and across the canvas. Embracing experimentation and chance, both artists create abstract paintings that study light, color, and movement. Macnaughton and Day have a complex and intuitive handling of paint, balancing raw expression with restraint. Each artist builds upon Abstract Expressionism’s gestural marks and expressive potential for color, adding their own personal narratives.”
Small works are like notes for bigger paintings. They can happen fast like a deep breath or a sudden thought.
I believe that color is ingrained in us, whether we can fully see it or not - it’s always there. I collect moments of both synesthetic color and color that’s really there to bring it back to my studio and dissect. It’s often emotional. It’s often personal. But, that’s usually where the meaningful stuff lies. — Link in bio read more about my recent artist residency.
Today I ordered Play-doh off of amazon as an attempt to incorporate more experiment and play into my studio practice. For those of you that want to know what I do during the day, now you have it. 🤸🏼‍♀️ Are You Serious # 6 + Chatham # 3, mixed media on paper, 30” x 22”, 2019 💫 on view @joshualinergallery.
Setting aside time for the residency was a big deal for me. It seemed like a rare gift to focus on a new body of work, free from any distractions. That meant completely silencing components of my practice I’ve grown accustomed to like meetings, emails, and phone calls. I started planning for the residency six months in advance, blocking out my schedule and finishing up paintings so I could have a singular focus in Chatham. ❄️ Read my latest essay on my blog about my month long artist residency @the_macedonia_institute. Link in bio.
Every mark I make is a reaction to the previous. It’s a physical process and I work on several pieces at once, careful to allow each painting time to settle before making the next decision. The negative space in my work is equally as important as the marks my body is making. - ‘Pour’ is on view @joshualinergallery until February 23rd.
Dusting off my sketchbooks and bringing that process back into my routine. I’ve been keeping sketchbooks since I was 12 but if you were to look through my archives you’d see an inconsistent pattern of gaps in each year. I’ll carry them with me religiously for several months on end and eventually it’s as though I lost interest. Looking back through, I’ve found I would put the sketchbook away when I was ready dive into bigger paintings. I wanted to rest my mind when I wasn’t in the studio, rather than always being on.