Published by Walther König, Köln. Edited with text by Dirk Luckow. Text by John Corbett, Evelyn C. Hankins, Katy Siegel.
Combining humor with references to literature, pop culture, metaphysics and personal history, German-born, New York– and Marfa-based painter Charline von Heyl (born 1960) creates paintings that offer in her words, “a new image that stands for itself as fact.” This catalog is published on the occasion of her show at Washington DC's Hirshhorn Gallery and Sculpture Garden, her largest US museum survey. The catalog was designed in close collaboration with von Heyl, with a new painting created specifically for the cover and a rare Z-fold binding that effectively separates the images and texts into two connected yet independent, mirror-image books. New York Magazine's Jerry Saltz included this catalog in a list of his favorite recent art books, writing: "this beautifully designed book is devoted to the artistic fireworks and optical accomplishments of … von Heyl, whom one critic has called 'the most exciting American painter right now.' The charismatic intelligence pictured in these ever-changing, highly charged, intensely graphic, and profusely colored paintings may well convince you of that."
Published by Kerber. Text by Kirsty Bell, Gavin Delahunty. Foreword by Andrea Nixon, Francesco Manacorda, Ellen Seifermann.
New York-based artist Charline von Heyl’s (born 1960) abstract paintings, in which dynamic forms enfold graphic structures and dazzling colors encounter muted shades, vibrate with tension. Now or Else offers an in-depth view of her oeuvre, focusing on works from the mid-1990s and a selection of current works on paper.
Published by Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania. Preface by Claudia Gould. Text by Jenelle Porter. Interview by Kaja Silverman.
Charline von Heyl (born 1960) synthesizes elements of Cubism, Abstract Expressionism and the brasher imagery of popular culture in a fascinating brand of abstraction that seems eternally poised on the lip of figuration. Resolutely devoted to energetic gesture and joyous expression, von Heyl also aspires to create images that declare an enigmatic self-sufficiency: “What I’m trying to do is to create an image that has the iconic value of a sign but remains ambiguous in its meaning,” she told Bomb magazine in a 2010 interview. “Something that feels like a representation but isn’t.” In the spirit of von Heyl’s work, this volume--published for the artist’s first U.S. museum survey-- attempts to break free of the conventions of the museum catalogue, with an artist-designed cover and poster-sized reproductions of each of the 18 paintings included in the show.