In this her third New York City solo exhibition, Heather Stivison explores the intersection of environmental science and visual art in immersive paintings of the ocean. Some of the paintings on view are the result of Stivison’s multi-year collaboration with Noah Germolus, a scientist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. This collaboration led to a unique feature of this exhibition. Stivison interpreted chemical data in paint, and he in turn, wrote four original musical compositions to accompany her paintings. The exhibition includes a play-on-demand sound installation of original jazz music composed and performed by Germolus.

The exhibition features a sampling of oil and acrylic paintings from several bodies of Stivison’s work—all of which capture the essence of water. Curator Renee Phillips writes, “Stivison ventures beyond nature’s physical boundaries into abstraction with the profusion of free-flowing biomorphic patterns and tonal ranges. In her paintings the innate attributes of water evolve into metaphors, symbolism and visual poetry.”

Stivison is especially fascinated by the reflections and patterns created by the ocean’s surface. In a group of surface paintings she explores how much she can alter and abstract ocean patterns, while still maintaining the sense that the subject is surface water. Other paintings in the exhibition explore ocean depths, including some that visualize chemical mysteries within scientist Germolus’ specific ocean zones of exploration. A centerpiece of the exhibition is a massive 110-inch quadriptych offers the sense of weightlessness and mystery that she finds in the unknown ocean depths.

Independent curator Kathy Imlay writes, “Stivison’s paintings have a luminous glow—accomplished by the artist building up layer upon layer of viscous paint, which she pours, smears, scrapes and otherwise manipulates to create fields of color that conjure the watery depths of the ocean…”

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