|
|
| Carl Heldt grew up on a
farm in rural Stanford, Ill. where his interest in art
surfaced at an early age. By the time he was nine, he
was sketching cattle in the field, painting scenes on the
doors in his mothers kitchen, and constructing colorful
tissue paper mosaics to give an ordinary window in his
one-room schoolhouse the look of stained glass. |
| Heldt graduated from high school at the
height of World War II and joined the Army air Corps in 1943
to train as a pilot. After his discharge he enrolled
at the University of Illinois where he graduated with a BFA
in painting in 1951. Commissions to create mobiles for
Chicago's Merchandise Mart led to large-scale projects,
including a 10-foot sculpture for the Marquette Medical
Center and a 110-foot metal mural for the Kahler Hotel
Hemisphere room in the Rochester, MN home of the Mayo
Clinic. |
| When the University of Illinois invited
him to join their art facility in 1956, Heldt accepted, and
began a 35-year career in the academic art, most of the time
spent as art professor at the University of Arizona in
Tucson, where Heldt and his family relocated in 1961.
Heldt painted during this period, often working into the
early morning hours. His abstract series of
multi-layered impastos won critical acclaim for their bold
compositions and radiating color. Summer breaks from
teaching were spent at Hallmark's headquarters in Kansas
City where Heldt became the company's artist-in-resident. |
| His evolution as an artist has never
followed a predictable line, and Heldt's early work bears
little resemblance to what he does today. "What I do and
what media I work in depends entirely on the reality of the
moment," he says. |
| For Heldt, now the Professor Emeritus of
Art, the reality of the moment is found-wood sculptures that
explore the realm of Abstract Expressionism. His
three-dimensional compositions are fused with geometrics and
texture that come from striking arrangements of salvaged
wood and architectural cast-offs. A baluster from a
stairway, a spindle leg from a chair, a croquet ball, drawer
runner, or remnant of a tabletop all come to life again in
Heldt's masterful compositions of ordered elegance. |
|
Heldt's 36" x 36" and 22" x 22" wall sculptures are
distinguished by their potential for interchangeability.
The panels can be displayed alone or arranged in near
endless combinations making them evolving entities in a
home, office or building. Subtle accents or orange
and jade add contrast within rich palettes of natural
wood tones. Other Heldt sculptures are painted in
monochromatic shades of off-white to awaken you to the
interplay of shadow and light that dance around and
within his compositions.
Throughout his life, Heldt's
unique artistic style and versatility have attracted
widespread audiences for his bold paintings,
freestanding metal sculptures and found-wood
assemblages. Heldt's art is owned by more than
50 institutions and 200 private collections
throughout North America. He is listed in
"Who's Who in American Art, The Artists' Bluebook,
Davenport's Art Reference-Gold edition, themes in
American painting, and Who's Who in the West.
|
|
|
