Heidi Lewis Coleman is a big fan of legendary artist Robert Rauschenberg, who made Captiva Island the epicenter of his artistic pursuits from 1970 until his death in 2008. Coleman never met Rauschenberg. She moved to Naples in 2021, 13 years after Rauschenberg’s death. But at the opening of her “Dreamscape” solo show at the Alliance for the Arts, she learned that she and Rauschenberg had something in common.
“How wonderful!” she exclaimed upon learning of the unintended connection. “I didn't know that, but I do love his work.”
In 1982, Rauschenberg traveled to Jingxian, China to collaborate with the Xuan Paper Mill to produce his renowned "7 Characters" series. Sequestered in an isolated "VIP compound" he created 490 collages that combined traditional Chinese paper with paper pulp relief, silk, and colorful found street posters from Shanghai.
Coleman similarly incorporates tissue-thin paper from Southeast Asia into her abstract collages.
“The paper that I use to collage is a tissue that's made in Thailand using the Kozo plant,” she explained. “What's great about it is it's translucent, so when I apply it to my canvas, you can see my paint coming through the tissue."
Kozo paper also contains embedded fibers.
“They embed natural fibers like petals and leaves and stems, and so that creates movement and texture across the surface of my painting,” Coleman noted. “When I add the paper to my work, it ends up being something totally different and something that I didn't expect, which I love. So, it's a surprise for me, too.”
The result are ephemeral, atmospheric assemblages that serve as a portals into a magical, otherworldly realm. But the artist expects her viewers to provide the endings of the stories her earth-toned "Dreamscapes" suggest.
“Dreamscapes” is on view in the Foulds Lobby Theatre at the Alliance for the Arts through May 30.
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Heidi Lewis Coleman is an award-winning artist who has exhibited widely in galleries and museums across the country. She studied art at Parsons and the New York School of Design in New York City, where she graduated with highest honors. Her artwork can be found in several private collections.
Coleman’s process
Coleman uses thin washes of acrylic paint and pastels to create her compositions, building layer upon layer that imbues her artwork with an atmospheric, ephemeral quality.
She wasn’t always an abstract painter. She started out doing tightly constructed still life and while she admires realism, abstract is better suited to her aesthetic sensibilities.
“I got kind of restless with it, and my work became more and more abstracted. Now it's very abstract. I'm really interested in abstract work because I think it's more the essence of nature, more about the feeling you get as you’re creating a work,” said Coleman. “I had a little girl come up to me tonight and ask me if I could explain my artwork, and I thought, well, you know, I think the nice thing about abstract work is it really is about what you think when you see it.”
Coleman relishes the interactive aspect of abstract painting.
“When you look at a painting of a sunset, you say, oh, that's a sunset,” she explained. “When you're looking at an abstract, you’re saying, what does that mean? How does that make me feel? And that's what I like about abstract work.”
Hers is an oft-repeated story. She fell in love with art as a young child and studied art in school. But she couldn’t find a way to make a decent living as an artist so closed that chapter in her life and went to work for IBM.
“I went for 20 years without doing any art whatsoever,” Coleman remarked. “Then I returned to art. But when I picked it up, it all came back immediately. If it's there in you, it's always there in you.”
For Coleman, the pivot point was attending an art show.
“The work really inspired me,” she recalled. “I loved the artist's work. I loved what she was doing. And I thought, you know what? If I went back to this, I might be able to do something that's not dissimilar from that. So, I just started to dabble. Before I knew it, I was just immersed in it again."
That was in 1990.
She exhibited work throughout Connecticut and New York prior to relocating to Naples in 2021. She’s still in the process of becoming acquainted with Southwest Florida’s galleries and art centers – not just as venues to show her art, but as places to enjoy art and find inspiration.
Such as The Baker Museum and the Naples Art Institute.
And the Marco Island Center for the Arts and Arts Bonita Visual Arts Center.
And now, the Alliance for the Arts.
“It's really fun to see my art in this show when you can walk [into the adjoining gallery] and see such beautiful representational pieces,” said Coleman. “Whenever there's a play of abstract versus representational, it's my favorite kind of show. I really like to see how the two compare, play against each other. This is a great event with these three shows, a good place to see that.”
The art of papermaking
Papermaking originated in China in the first century AD. The art was brought to Japan in 610 AD by Buddhist monks who produced it for writing sutras. By the year 800, Japan's skill in papermaking was unrivalled, and from these ancient beginnings have come papers in a wide range of color, texture and design.
The knowledge of papermaking did not reach Europe until the 13th century.
By the late 1800s, there were more than 80,000 families in Japan who were making paper by hand. With the introduction of mechanized papermaking technology from Europe coupled with the Westernization of products and markets, the production of Japanese paper declined. By 1983, only 479 papermaking families were left. Today the few remaining families struggle to compete in the world market with handmade paper from India, Thailand and Nepal, where a lower cost of living makes it possible to produce paper more cheaply.
Thai Kozo Paper
Kozo paper is a durable, long-fibered paper made from the inner bark of the mulberry tree (Broussonetia papyrifera). Lightweight, translucent, absorbent and exceptionally strong, it is used in art, printmaking and conservation.
Japanese Kozo is regarded as the finest, most durable, pure fiber art paper. It cannot be cultivated. Instead, it is hand-tended and harvested in the wild. While fiber from the Thai mulberry tree (Broussonetia papyrifera) is identical, botanically, to the Japanese Kozo, its warm climate growing conditions result in a difference in the fiber's characteristics. The fibers are often often oil-spotted and slightly coarser. The natural oil spots appear as blemishes in the paper, which also has fiber knots from unpruned branches. However, both sources of Kozo are delicate, translucent and textured, which make it perfect for oil, acrylic, watercolor and collage applications.
Japanese paper or washi is made from fiber from three renewable shrubs indigenous to Japan, kozo, mitsumata and gampi. Kozo is the most widely used. It has the longest fiber, which converts into the strongest paper. It is grown as a farm crop, and the branches are cut annually. The plants regenerate continually for about 40 years.
Mitsumata has softer, shorter fibers with a warm tone. While it is also grown as a crop, mitsumata takes three to five years to regenerate, which makes it more expensive.
Gampi was the earliest plant used and is considered to be the noble fiber. It’s noted for its richness, dignity and longevity. It has an exquisite natural sheen and is often made into very thin tissues. Gampi has a naturally "sized" finish which does not bleed when written or painted on. Gampi resists cultivation and is mainly harvested in the wild. It is increasingly difficult for papermakers to acquire Japanese-grown gampi.
Other fibers such as hemp, abaca, wood pulp and rayon are sometimes used for papermaking or mixed in with the other fibers.
More about Rauschenberg and his 1982 collaboration with the Xuan paper mill
Bob Rauschenberg created a series of unique collages representing seven Chinese characters in collaboration with papermakers at the Xuan Paper Mill in Jingxian, China. To create these collages, Rauschenberg added a pulp relief to a base of 30-ply Xuan paper and a layer of silk. Images from posters found in Shanghai were then attached and overlaid with a thin transparent paper. Rauschenberg then applied gold leaf and a cloth medallion to each work. In all, he produced 70 sets of collages or 490 total works. Published by Gemini G.E.L., Los Angeles, many of the works were included in connection with an exhibition held at the National Art Gallery in Beijing in 1985.
Rauschenberg took numerous color photographs during this same trip. He assimilated them into a 100-foot-long photographic work that captured everyday life in China during this period. He titled the piece "Chinese Summerhall."
The 1982 journey was a catalyst for the Rauschenberg Overseas Cultural Interchange (ROCI) project, which aimed to foster communication through art.
Support for WGCU’s arts & culture reporting comes from the Estate of Myra Janco Daniels, the Charles M. and Joan R. Taylor Foundation, and Naomi Bloom in loving memory of her husband, Ron Wallace.
