about

About Mary Heebner

Heebner earned her BFA from College of Creative Studies studying with Paul Wonner, Charles Garabedian, Gerald Haggerty, and her MFA from UCSB, with her mentor, artist William Dole. She has distinguished herself as a collage artist, and pairs her writing and images in her artists books, founding Simplemente Maria press in 1995. Her work is held in numerous collections including the John Paul Getty Research Institute, The US Library of Congress, The New Your Public Library, The National Gallery of Art, The British Museum, San Francisco, Los Angeles County and Santa Barbara Museums of Art, The Gap, Dartmouth College, University Libraries that include Stanford, Wesleyan, Columbia, Iowa, Buffalo, Indiana, Michigan, Universities of California.

Artist’s Statement

“Only connect.“ E.M. Forester

There is a story in everything. My intent has always been to form bridges between words and images. My task as an artist is to discover the core, the essence of the story and then to find the form that best conveys it in a well-crafted and compelling manner. 

I seek ways to connect and transpose the warmth and wonder our brief lives embody on Earth—intimations of deep Beauty and those initial sparks of Inspiration—into something physical, an object that can be held, touched, shared with others. I aim to create sensually abstract compositions and artists books in which both form and content are equally important.

Fragments, both literal and metaphoric, are integral to the creation of my paintings, collages, handmade-paper, travel journaling, photography, and artists books. As such, a shadow of a memory becomes the template for a new idea, parsed from a personal, cultural, imagined or dreamed landscape. My practice is deeply grounded in a sense of place, the distinct mythologies, geology, archaeology, language and experiences therein. How do we embody the land we inhabit? How do we delve beneath the surface of our physical selves? How do we connect?

Selected Exhibitions

2022. Prayer Flags & a Tale of Longing, exhibit and lecture, The Architectural Foundation of Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA

2020/2021 “Bridging: Image & Word—25 Years of Simplemente Maria Press” Special Collections Library Gallery, University of California, Santa Barbara CA catalog

2020 “Intimacy: Collages and artists books by Mary Heebner” Bromer Gallery, Boston, MA

2019 “The Muse Project: Mary Heebner artist, and Jeff Shelton architect” Art, Design & Architecture Museum, University of California, Santa Barbara CA

2016-2017 “Intimacy: Drawing with Light, Drawn from stone” exhibition, Museo della Carta e della Filigrana, Fabriano, Italy and Open Studio Exhibit as a Visiting Artist at the American Academy in Rome, Rome, Italy 

2014 “Silent Faces: Angkor” M. Freeman Center for East Asian Study, Wesleyan University, CT

2014 “Mary Heebner: A Survey of 19 Years of Artist’s Books from Simplemente Maria Press and the Paintings that Inspired Them” Western Michigan University and The Kalamazoo Book Art Center, Kalamazoo, MI 

2013 “The Venus Paintings” Edward Cella Art+Architecture, Los Angeles, CA solo exhibit, artist’s talk, and illus. catalogue with Essay by Dr. Bruce Robertson.

2009 “Intimacies / Intimismos: Transpositions from the Poetry of Pablo Neruda” Queen Sofia Spanish Institute, New York, NY, Director: Inmaculada de Hapsburgo with poetry read by Alastair Reid and Patricia Cepeda 

2007 “Sacred Texts/Contemporary Forms: Spiritual Traditions in the Digital Age”, Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design curator: Leslie Fedorchuk, Milwaukee, WI

2006 “Mani Wall & A Sacred Geography” Fowler Museum of Art, UCLA, Los Angeles, for The Missing Peace, exhibit with poetry by Sienna Craig and photography by Macduff Everton. Curator, Director: Marla Berns 

2001 On the Blue Shore of Silence: Poems of the Sea by Pablo Neruda, exhibition of artist’s book and paintings at The United States Embassy Residencia, Santiago, Chile; and Fundación Neruda, ChilePoesía 

2001 “Artist’s Books about Artists,” Book as Art XIII, Curator: Krystyna Wasserman, National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington DC

2000 Permanent Collection of American Artists, The Chancery/United States Embassy Moscow, Russia The US Department of State, curator: Virginia Shore

2000“Western Horizon and Western Trilogy,” Mary Heebner watercolors & sketches with Macduff Everton photographs plus limited edition book. Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Santa Barbara CA & Rose Gallery, Bergamot Center, Santa Monica, CA

1988-86 “Collage: West Coast,” University of Oregon Museum of Art, Eugene, OR (traveling exhibition) curator: Michael Whitenack 

1983  “On, Of, and About Paper,” U.S.A.Today Exhibit, Washington, D.C.

1979 “Mary Heebner Collages and Dale Chihuly Glass,” Allrich Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1977 “Santa Barbara Drawings,” Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Santa Barbara, CA

1977 “Introducing Mary Heebner” Margaret Walker & Associates Atherton, and San Francisco, CA