ALMUT

HEISE

Galerie Michael Haas presents paintings and works on paper by the Hamburg artist spanning 4 decades.

The early and late works by Almut Heise (*1944 in Celle) are staged realities: she meticulously and accurately paints elaborately constructed interiors filled with furniture, lamps, rugs, wallpaper and objects with a 1950’s charm. Despite the apparent realism, it is immediately clear that the strangely lifeless spaces are composed and were never inhabited. Each object has its allocated place. In addition to interiors she portrays men and women – insightfully and yet with indifference. Seemingly natural poses are minutely contrived and follow a strict pictorial arrangement. Even the people blend into the bourgeois world from the Adenauer era in which Heise’s images return us to. Thanks to the comprehensive selection of oil paintings and works on paper, this exhibition provides a rare opportunity to study the development of her work from the late 1960s to the present day. She remains unwaveringly loyal to her style (which can be placed somewhere between “Neue Sachlichkeit”, American pop art and photo realism) despite the changing trends in visual art. Thus, this presentation emphatically demonstrates the singularity of Heise’s œuvre.

Almut Heise studied in Mainz and at the Hochschule für bildende Künste in Hamburg. She was a scholarship holder at the London Royal College of Art has received the Edwin Scharff Award and a Villa-Massimo residency. In 2000, she received highly remunerated Finkenwerder Award, endowed by Airbus. From 1978 until 2005 she taught at the Fachhochschule Hamburg in the design faculty.