i nr eview Tulsa, Oklahoma Reviewed by Barbara Shapiro
Heather Clark Hilliard: Finding the Fire 108 Contemporary The burgeoning Brady Arts District in Tulsa, Oklahoma, is home to 108 Contemporary, a sleek nonprofit art gallery that featured the mixedmedia work of Heather Clark Hilliard last summer. Memory Ring was the showpiece of her monthlong artist residency (July 2013). This site-specific installation, which included hundreds of cascading indigo-dyed wood slices, explored the history of Oklahoma's changing landscape through the only native evergreen, the juniper tree. Issues of recent local drought and the larger global environmental picture were inherent. Hilliard’s working presence in the gallery led to important conversations. Hilliard is totally committed to the essence of her craft and the study of natural dyes, combined meaningfully with less malleable manmade or natural objects. The elegant
collection of works on display afforded rare double access to artistic process and refined conceptual art. Indeed, Hilliard’s work is much about process. She travels the country to gather her materials, and the well-documented plant dye sources themselves become part of the work. On one such trip from Oklahoma to Maine, pre-mordanted cottons were added to quart canning jars along with the plants she collected, turning the back of her van into a traveling dye studio. Her crisp photos of 36 jars with dyestuff and cloth formed one installation in the gallery. Nearby, an assemblage of 36 individually framed cloth samples from those same jars maps a travelogue of tone and saturation in Collected Color VII. Building on her time as a student at the Rhode Island School of Design, and intent on perfecting her craft, Hilliard has sought out the best dye teachers available. This proactive approach gives her a broad education that translates into artistic confidence. Wood Triptych and Haunted Blues combine reclaimed cedar siding, earth pigments, and plant-dyed silk patches. Walnut ink “stitches” painted onto some 30 layers of color and cloth gives new life to the weathered wood, making these works a quilted commentary on surface.
ABOVE: HEATHER CLARK HILLIARD Gallery view of the Ring of Fire exhibit before construction of Memory Ring began. INSET: HEATHER CLARK HILLIARD Ocean Bones Detail, 170 Pacific Ocean driftwood pieces, titanium earth pigment, soy milk, Lincoln Log, wool, waxed linen, aluminum wire, 129" x 40" x 2", 2013. Photos: Steven Michael's Photography.
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Surface Design Journal
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