Announcing Ariana Heinzman’s exhibition, It’s Good to be Here

(Seattle, WA) –April 4, 2022 – J. Rinehart Gallery is delighted to announce It’s Good to be Here, an immersive ceramic garden of hand build vessels and wall mounted tiles by Vashon Island based ceramicist, Ariana Heinzman. Grounded in the artist's relationship with nature, bold color and botanical patterns cover the otherwise naked ceramic forms.

It’s Good to be Here will be on view online and in the gallery May 14 - June 18, 2022. An opening reception will be held in the gallery Saturday, May 14, 2022, from 3-6pm. The Gallery will be hosting an artist Meet & Greet – tentative date to come.

It’s Good to be Here views vessels as a stand-in for the human figure. Ariana Heinzman’s artwork is an embodiment of humanity’s inseparable relationship to the earth. The forms embrace the historic utilitarian nature of pottery. Her work is a metaphor for realizing one’s own nudity and having the overwhelming urge to cover it up. Heinzman wields patterns of leaves to cover the ceramic form, her work becomes an allegory for The Garden of Eden.

Using the anthropomorphic clay vessel, she blends the identities of earth, plant, and body into one, either to hide one’s true self or to find it. Her style uses bold lines and color to hide, to over- accentuate, or to balance the relationship between form and surface.

Of her work, Heinzman says:
“The duality of each form celebrates the beauty of life while acknowledging a human longing to have a deeper connection to the land. The collection presents a surface level interpretation of nature - inviting the viewer to pose questions. “

Ariana Heinzman received her BFA in Ceramics from The Rhode Island School of Design in 2013 and has been creating and exhibiting her work regularly ever since. Including locally in exhibitions at the Vashon Center for the Arts, Pottery Northwest and is included in Seattle University’s Private Art Collection.