Down Lowe
Diving deep with lenticular artist and curator, Heather Lowe
I’ve posted more newsletters than usual this month because I have a couple of timely artist features to share with you. Two talented fellow artists, Heather and Adeola, will be appearing with me in this show titled “Divination” at Keystone Art Space, and I’d love for you to join us, if you can, at the opening in Los Angeles this Saturday.
[There are about a dozen other amazing artists in this show, but I don’t have interviews with them, so please come meet them on Saturday!]
Today I want to introduce you to Heather Lowe, artist and curator of Divination. Heather makes “lenticular” art using ribbed lenses with several images very painstakingly adhered onto the back, allowing the viewer to see more than one image at a time. These pictures seem to morph, flip and sometimes go into depth, creating an impression of movement when the viewer changes perspective. Other names for this process are “flickers,” “wiggle pictures” and “tilt cards.”
In a previous show at this location, Heather, an avid reader, created lenticular artworks inspired by one of her favorite books, The Odyssey by Homer.
The Odyssey is the story of a man named Odysseus who, after fighting for ten years in the Trojan War, just wants to go home. But the Gods have other plans for him, and his return journey takes another ten years during which he encounters a Cyclops, a witch, Sirens, the dual gnashing and drowning monsters Scylla and Charybdis, and the charms of a beautiful Nymph named Calypso who makes Odysseus forget he ever wanted to get home at all.
For Heather, this story is about traveling through darkness and confusion, but eventually returning to light, a journey many of us can relate to.
The parallels between Greek storytelling and contemporary life began to reveal themselves in her own journeys around Los Angeles, where Heather saw many examples of the past linking, or perhaps rhyming, with the present. The waves of the ocean reminded her of the wave motifs in ancient mosaics, a spiraling hawk evoked Apollo’s “swift winged messengers” and street art on the back of a truck brought to mind the opening arms of an Olympian God.
In Divination, Heather continues her exploration of life’s entangled mythopoetic mysteries by bringing together a group of artists deep-diving into the ancient and arcane contemplations provided by tarot, tasseography, augury, geomancy, scrying, clairalience, chance, chiromancy, palmistry, cleromancy, ifá, pendulum dowsing, astrology and dream reading.
Heather’s artistic inspirations give us shifting views of reality, drawing lines between the deep past and contemporary life in startling ways.
“…for the gods do not let themselves be seen by everybody.” ---The Odyssey, book XVI
All images in this article ©Heather Lowe
Divination is on now view at Keystone Art Space, 338 S. Avenue 16 Los Angeles, CA 90031 July 17-July 29.Opening reception, Saturday July 20, 5-9 pm. Ample and safe street parking. Find more details about artists and special guests on FB https://www.facebook.com/events/1686482611889747
Beautiful description of Heather Lowe's work. creates a desire to meet her, see her work--lenticular art based on the Odysseus.