Heather Wilcoxon

Heather Wilcoxon Description

Heather Wilcoxon lives and works in the Bay Area. She received her BFA and  MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute .  She has exhibited widely, including the San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, The DiRosa Center for Contemporary Art,  The Boulder Museum of Contemporary of Art,  The American University Museum, in Washington DC., The Triton Museum and The Fresno Art Museum.

Her work is in several permanent collections  including The Fine Arts Museum, Auchenbach Foundation of Graphic Arts in San Francisco, the De Saisset Museum, The Fresno Art Museum, and The Triton Museum.

She has received several fellowship awards. Two from the Pollock/ Krasner Foundation in New York. Three painting grants from the Buck Foundation in Marin County.  A residency fellowship from the Djerassi Artist Residency Program. A grant from the Tree of Life Foundation in North Carolina and The Distinguished Women in the Arts Award from the Fresno Art Museum.

Heather Wilcoxon Statement

Emotion is truth, which is what I put into my paintings.  I have always been an activist and use my work to express my feelings about certain issues.  Whether it’s political, social, environmental,  or personal,  without these feelings, I have nothing to say. 

My practice has evolved over the years. . Early on I would collage drawings and incorporate quirky, dark cartoonish imagery into my paintings. But as I matured, I let that process go and just use paint and paint alone.  I work in a series.   Sometimes lasting several years.  Because I live on the water and have sailed the Pacific Ocean, boats have been a big part of my life.  Those vessel  forms  continue to be very present in my practice. Various other forms I also use in my paintings  like the figure, heads, ladders and houses.   During the pandemic,  I worked on a series of portraits with masks as well as a series I call Home Alone using houses  and ladders to  show our isolation during that period.  I continue to use all of these forms in my work to  reflect our on going struggles  in our contemporary world.

 My paintings involve layering sometimes over older works. The richer the surface the better. Drawing is also important part of my practice. I draw almost everyday. It keeps my skills sharp as well as my imagination flowing and alive.  I also am interested in other materials like clay, assemblage, monoprinting, book making and film. I like to experiment with these different materials. They challenge my thinking and add a layer of knowledge to my practice.