Heidi Elbers Fine Art

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Heidi Elbers

Interlaced, 2017
oil on canvas
48 x 30 inches

Siren, 2017
oil on canvas
36 x 24 inches

Stella, 2017
oil on canvas
36 x 24 inches

Rituals, 2017
oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches

Ceremonies, 2017
oil on canvas
24 x 18 inches

Connecting with my cultural heritage as a Louisiana native, I paint what I know and that is a celebration of artful dress influenced by the elaborate costumes of Mardi Gras but with a reductive sense of elegance and style. My mother grew up in the Bayou as a daughter of a fur trapper, while my father’s mother was raised in the world of elaborate balls and social soirées. I marry these two worlds in the costumes I create for my muses, close friends and acquaintances that fit my own personal aesthetic.

Pieced together from lingerie and fur pieces, laced and beaded, stitched and glued, the outfits I create transforms them into mythological gods and goddesses or a tribe, if you will, of superior beings that escape the blemishes of everyday trials and tribulations. My grandmother used to say, “You can’t feel bad if you look pretty,” an adage that I embrace in my creations.

Fur, feathers and foliage bring a natural element of something more elemental, connecting these very civilized beings to more fundamental origins, elevated by beauty and a sense of innate self-possession. From photographs taken in my studio, I translate these mirages of celestial beauty in oil on paper and canvas in an alla prima style that some interpret as watercolor at first glance. There is a quiet stillness that allows the viewer to observe them, often in a moment of self-reflection. Even when the model gazes outwards, it is as if they are gazing inwards, into a mirrored image that contains their thoughts and adds an element of mystery.

All that glistens is not gold, but with paint, brush and imagination, for a moment, I escape into a world of beauty that outshines ordinary or austere reality and gives each cloud a thread of silver lining.

Crescent City Queen, 2017
oil on panel
12 x 15.75 inches

Born in 1985 right outside of New Orleans, Louisiana, Heidi Elbers knew she wanted to be an artist in her early.
She earned her B.A. from Southeastern Louisiana University in 2008 and
graduated at the top of her class. While at SELU, she had music and
art scholarships and played flute professionally throughout the New Orleans area. She also studied at the New Orleans Academy of Fine Arts. In 2008, she moved to New York City to attend graduate school at the New York Academy of Art. After completing her
MFA in 2010, she moved to Bushwick where she is an active member of the art community. Elbers has shown her work nationally at places such as Bernarducci Meisel Gallery, Sotheby’s, Flowers Gallery, NY, The Lodge Gallery, Island Weiss Gallery, Storefront Ten Eyck, Southampton Arts Center, and Southeastern Contemporary Art Gallery. She has been featured in publications including The Huffington Post, T Magazine, W Magazine, Guest of a Guest, Fine Art Connoisseur, Poets and Artists, ApartmentTherapy.com, Buzzfeed.com, The Brooklyn Rail, and Hyperallergic.

Aside from her studio practice, she currently works as the Director of Exhibitions and Alumni Affairs at the New York Academy of Art.