Artist: Heidi Van Leuven

In this body of work, I have approached the same subject matter – social structures – through various techniques and media. I have chosen this subject matter after consistently observing and experiencing people base their decisions not on their own personal intuition, but on that which is dictated by any number of social pressures they are presented with.





My paintings reflect the questionable nature of the social norms. We live in a throw-away society which is most commonly linked with consumerism and short-lived products, but it seems that we carry that same idea over into our concept of time and judgment. These decisions we make as humans create social structures, which I portray metaphorically through the use of grids and lines.




Broadway Central Hotel
diptych left

Broadway Central Hotel
diptych right

These social structures I refer to are often created as an attempt to control situations and other people, but in reality, what is created is a meaningless illusion of control. A quote by John Dewey comes to mind when describing this:



“Our magical safeguard against the uncertain character of the world is to deny the existence of chance, to mumble universal and necessary law, the ubiquity of cause and effect, the uniformity of nature, universal progress, and the inherent rationality of the universe...
...But when all is said and done, the fundamentally hazardous character of the world is not seriously modified, much less eliminated”

Weathered




Things accepted as truth based on false illusions and without adequate information (whether due to inexperience or ignorance), lack valid placement in the spectrum of fortified knowledge. Through my artwork I aspire to generate the interrogation that will cultivate the realization of such knowledge.

Unsettlements

Or So I Thought