Andrea Hegeman, Chilean (1948 - )

Born in Santiago, Chile

Educational Backround
Escuela de Bellas Artes, Universidad de Chile
Otis/Parsons School of Art; Los Angeles, Ca.
Parsons School of Design, N.Y., N.Y.

Solo Exhibitions
2000 Galeria Andreu, Santiago, Chile "Cuerpos de Tierra y Bronce" (Bodies of Earth and Bronze) (pdf)
2003 Galeria Praxis, Santiago, Chile "Retrato de una Corte" (Portrait of a Court Scene) (pdf)
Group Exhibitions: (selected)
1995 Interdeco, Santiago, Chile "Los Artistas y sus Objetos"
1998 Museo de Bellas Artes (Galeria/tienda) Santiago, Chile "Torsos"
2001 Galeria Artespacio, Santiago, Chile "Feria Escultorica"
Caldwell Snyder Gallery, San Francisco, California – Group Show
2002 Galeria Praxis, Santiago, Chile "Mujeres mas Color"
Embajada de Chile, Beijing, China – Group Show
2004 Galeria La Sala, Santiago, Chile - "Moviles"
2005 Instituto Cultural de Las Condes, Santiago, Chile "Escultura en Ceramica"
2008 Jane Hartsook Gallery, N.Y., N.Y. Group Exhibit
2009 Jane Hartsook Gallery, N.Y., N.Y.

Artist's Statement:

I run my hands through clay and its like a living body; soft, wet, tactile, pliable. It speaks of Earth (clay), Water (the way a river carves its bed, water forms the clay) Air and Fire (to dry, to burn). The primary elements of life coalesce in this process and I witness and participate in the transformation at each stage of development.

Working with clay requires the artist to alter their day-to-day relationship with time, waiting for the precise moment when one can build, model, carve, draw or fire...So for me it's a dance between ideas, expression and this medium which has its own inherent nature that I find always challenging and surprising.

The origins, structures and cycles of organic life with its inexhaustible creation of forms continues to mesmerize.

The symbolic quality of the egg-as-creation has permeated art history which in turn has influenced my work. In the Brera Madonna (1472), by Piero della Francesca, the Virgin is seated with child and a single egg hangs over the dome directly over the figures. In Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights (1480) his figures enter and emerge from egg-like shells, seeming to return to a womb-like existence. Brancusi, through the ovoid, expresses his symbolic approach to reality.

I group these primary forms so they relate to one another as families; suddenly they seem as family portrait. You can see the similarities, yet each is very much an individual. I like the idea of a still life, where a moment in time is captured. Like family portraits my works, singularly or together, are a reminder of continuity, of this cycle of life that goes on and on.