Spotlight on... Heimo Wallner

Author: Grace Duggan

Born and raised in Austria, C.A. Johnson Artist-in-Residence Heimo Wallner attended the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts before going on to show his work in Austria as well as all over the United States, including New York City, San Antonio, Milwaukee's Hagerty Museum of Art and Amherst. His last exhibition at Middlebury was two years ago during which work of his appeared in the Johnson Pit. Wallner sat down with The Middlebury Campus earlier this week to discuss "Wallpaper," his latest exhibition that opened on April 1 in the Johnson Gallery. Sponsored by the Program in Studio Art and open to the public until April 20, "Wallpaper" features a number of Wallner's prints and drawings.

The Middlebury Campus: When did you start creating art?

Heimo Wallner: Oh, you know, we are in a myth realm here, but I did a lot of drawing and painting when I was a kid, and unlike other kids I was not hindered from doing that. My parents were strangely supportive.

TC: When did you create the pieces that are in this exhibition?

HW: There will be two big pieces I made here. There are two prints from Columbia University and there will be a series of small drawings that's an ongoing project I started last year in China. I'm still working on that. I think I made 50 of those drawings here. I live in Austria but I live more and more in Middlebury. I spend a good chunk of the year in the United States. My wife, Hedya Klein, teaches here in the Studio Art Department. It is kind of my base.

TC: When discussing "Wallpaper" you mentioned creating "a vocabulary of emotions" in your work. Can you elaborate on that?

HW: I do agree with that, but it's more that you develop over time a certain vocabulary. I work spontaneously. I start with a project and I see where it leads me. I work associatively and emotions have a big say in that, in what state of mind you are in - tired, awake and all kinds of emotion. But it's not only about that. I think all other daily occurrences - news, books I read, movies I see - it all sneaks into my work. Even other artwork shows that I see. It's kind of the same for everyone. Your brain deals with what you deal with. So I try to follow this flow of thoughts and associations. It's a little bit like the automatic writing of the Surrealists, but it's not completely and I do reflect about what I draw. So it's not quite like that. I try to find out how I think and sometimes I even manage to surprise myself. Not so often, but sometimes.

TC: Would you say there's a unifying subject matter in your pieces?

HW: That's a funny question. It is and is not because it's always me and my brain. But sometimes drawings lead me into certain themes. One piece that I did here is about Austria and I'm not sure if people will see that, but I know that. A few years ago I did one piece at Amherst. It dealt with the USA and there was a lot of Americana in it. Cowboys, Indians, Iraq War and George Bush. But I only can keep it up for a certain time. Our trains of thoughts take very weird bends sometimes or go backwards or go somewhere completely else. I like that and I usually - in this case it's not possible - like to do shows where I draw directly on the walls. Then I can walk around the room, continue on one wall, go back, change. You know, like when your brain is idling.

TC: Can you speak to the important connection between body and emotion in your drawings?

HW: I think sometimes it starts literally with an elbow. I start drawing an elbow and out of the elbow follows the posture of the figure, and out of the posture of the figure follows what the figure is doing. If you've seen my drawings, there's a lot of sexuality, there's a lot of eating and being eaten, there's violence - the fears and the hopes and the desires that I think we all pretty much share. If you read fairy tales for kids this is pretty much human emotions and inner structure in a nutshell. It's about eating, it's about disappearing, appearing. I think of the Brothers Grimm - those are human emotions in pretty much every aspect. So if I use a lot of sexuality it's to establish relations between figures and those relations are often not very subtle. But it's by no means actually pornography. When I draw it takes awhile until the figures start to interact. And there's a state in drawings when the wall starts filling up and then certain dynamics start happening, and this is actually sometimes more the figures than me doing it. While I draw the first figure up, let's say, to the left side, I for sure don't know what will happen four feet further.