Artist and documentarian Heidi Mraz will be expanding the perception of the automobile to car aficionados and non-automotive enthusiasts alike through an all-new experiential art collection entitled ‘Driven to Abstraction’ during Miami’s premiere lifestyle Motorcar Cavalcade event, January 15, 2023, at the JW Marriott Turnberry Resort and Spa. Additionally, one special piece from the collection, ‘Abstracted Porsche 917’, valued at $12,500 will be offered as part of the event’s silent auction benefitting the American Cancer Society.
Mraz’s bespoke artworks are collected by some of the world’s foremost automotive collectors, brands, and museums. Mraz’s most recent exhibition was at Sotheby’s in London as part of the Royal Automobile Club’s London Motoring Week 2022.
ABOUT ‘DRIVEN TO ABSTRACTION’
There are many portraits of cars but none quite like that of Heidi Mraz’s latest collection ‘Driven to Abstraction’ a dynamic experiential series that depicts hidden cars at the threshold of recognition. When viewed at close range her work appears as colorful geometric abstractions, but from a distance or through a convex rearview mirror a remarkable optical illusion occurs — a portrait of a car is revealed.
“Visually speaking, up close our brains have a blind spot. I use this phenomenon in my art to mask the subject car using color and edges to distort perception,” said Mraz. “The magic happens when the viewer experiences “sudden perception” of seeing a car hidden in the composition. The key to unlocking the image of the car is distance, whether by stepping far enough back or viewing a shrunken version of the art in a convex rearview mirror, the painting transforms before your eyes inviting the viewer to reflect on the automobile as an artform.”
The ‘Driven to Abstraction’ exhibit includes eight mixed media artworks on canvas:
- Abstracted Porsche 917, Size 30×40” (To be auctioned)
- Abstracted Porsche 911, Size: 24×36”
- Abstracted Ferrari F40, Size: 30×60”
- Abstracted Ferrari LaFerrari, Size: 30×40”
- Abstracted BMW 328, Size: 34×30”
- Abstracted Lamborghini Countach, Size: 30×40”
- Abstracted Bugatti Type 35, Size: 24×48”
- Abstracted Bugatti Chiron, Size: 30×40”
Thrilled about the unveiling, Motorcar Cavalcade Co-Executive Director, Jason Wenig added, “Motorcar Cavalcade is not just about sharing a curated collection of rare and iconic automobiles, but we’re looking forward to providing an overall appreciation for cars as art, something Heidi intrinsically does in every piece of work she creates.”
‘Driven To Abstraction’ collection will debut at the Motorcar Cavalcade, where Mraz will be available for interviews throughout the weekend.
In addition, a selection of unique works from Mraz’s ‘Petal to the Metal’ collection will also be on display. The distinctive artwork conceptually reimagines automotive art, cultivating the idea that beauty can be found in both nature and machines.
All pieces are handcrafted with the semblance of exotic flowers out of layered paper cut from car magazines and her own images, then ‘rooted’ to a bed of brushed aluminum sheet metal. The end results are colorful, engineered ‘power plants’ masterfully styled as a vintage floral print. Botanical descriptions are replaced with car statistics and black line drawings are made of the featured vehicles rather than flowers. The series includes eight unique super car designs ranging from Koenigsegg to Bugatti.
ABOUT HEIDI MRAZ AUTOMOTIVE FINE ART
Bespoke in nature, Mraz’s artistry is fueled by her own passion for classic cars, appealing to sophisticated collectors who have a true appreciation for fine art and the automobile. Her unique abilities are driven by research and fueled by narrative to celebrate and preserve automotive history on canvas, resulting from months of historical study and investigative exploration. Her art is a complex and intricately hand-crafted process that incorporates hundreds of curated layers from books, catalogs, manuals, magazines, photographs, and more, and her intoxicating assemblages involve a variety of materials and textures – ranging from paper to metal – that, once finished, create one-of-a-kind, visual retrospect on a single canvas.
A beautiful example of Mraz’s process is “Beneath the Surface: Bugatti of Lake Maggiore,” (2019) mixed media assemblage inspired by the Mullin Automotive Museum’s famed “Lady of the Lake” 1925 Bugatti Type 22 Brescia that spent 75 years submerged in Lake Maggiore.
The story of the Bugatti and its resurrection were so extraordinary that Mraz was inspired to travel to Lake Maggiore and submerge her inked canvas in the lake at the very spot the Bugatti once rested. The lake waters washed away some of the pigment on the canvas, creating a haunting backdrop for Mraz’s assemblage which is as colorful as the Bugatti’s story. The collage itself is created from historical ephemera and automotive memorabilia along with images taken by Mraz – all celebrating the original Bugatti that now resides at the Mullin Museum. https://www.heidimraz.com/bespoke
“Beneath the Surface: Bugatti of Lake Maggiore,” is but one example of dozens of historically correct commissioned pieces, featured within Mraz’s “Art of Provenance” series of unique narratives.
Mraz’s most recent bespoke piece, Move. Earth. (2022) documented the story of the Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus Boot, a modern day, extreme all-terrain racing vehicle inspired by Steve McQueen’s Baja Boot. Mraz participated and documented the Boot’s journey as it raced 1,000 miles through a treacherous off-road Baja desert race, the 2021 NORRA Mexican 1000.
Mraz gathered and used more than 7,000 pieces of relevant material as well as a canvas that was dragged behind the Boot during the race and used as ground cover for the crew as they worked on the vehicle. The canvas, covered in sand, silt, grease and grime and the crew’s handprints made a gritty addition and lent additional authenticity to the final out-of-this-world portrait of the Boot, aptly titled: “Move. Earth.”
Several of Mraz’s artistic visions have also included some of the most impressive Porsche vehicles from the history of the marque, including:
- “Aerodynamics By Entomology” — a celebration of the legendary Porsche 917, chassis 917-022, that starred in the 1971 film “Le Mans,” recreated by Mraz with more than 1,000 paper butterflies and other insects to share the little-known story of how John Horsman solved the airflow problems of the 917 by noticing where there were, and were not, dead insects on the car. This unique portrayal spotlights this important moment in motorcar history and conceptually illustrates the transformation of Porsche’s 917 from an unstable monster to an immortal race car.
- For “Shaped by The Wind” the visual retrospect of Porsche 906-134, known as the first model Porsche designed in a wind tunnel – Mraz documented wind direction and speed using windblown pigment over a replica model 906 in a self-created wind tunnel. “Shaped by The Wind” now resides at the Collector Car Gallery at Monticello Motor Club in NY as part of their permanent collection.
ABOUT HEIDI MRAZ
Heidi Mraz is a contemporary artist as well as an automotive fine artist and documentarian working in Great Falls, Virginia. Her car-inspired art works are part of several international art collections. Mraz’s automobile-inspired art is emotional, intentional as well as representational. As an artist growing up in the car world, she found inspiration in what many people consider mundane: a car. But every car has a story. A member of the Guild of Motoring Artists, Mraz is also an Artist Pro-Tem for the prestigious Torpedo Factory Art Center in Virginia. She has been the official poster artist for Pinehurst Concours d’Elegance in North Carolina and for the Art in Motion Concours in New York and is commissioned annually to paint the winning cars of the globally renowned Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance. She is a consulting curator for The White Collection in San Francisco and has judged several major American concours. Mraz has authored a book for a private collector on the 1951 OSCA MT4 Vignale and currently has a feature-length documentary in production, entitled “AUTOMOTIVE ARTIFACTS”, which chronicles the behind-the-scenes work of her history-inspired automotive assemblages. Her most recent exhibition was at Sotheby’s in London as part of the Royal Automobile Club’s London Motoring Week 2022. www.heidimraz.com
ABOUT THE MOTORCAR CALVACADE
Motorcar Cavalcade is a celebration of the automobile and the people that love them in an unforgettable and unmatched unification of cars, cuisine, and lifestyle. For 2023, the annual event will be hosted at the prestigious JW Marriott Turnberry Resort and Spa and is open to the public. Tickets can be purchased at: https://www.motorcarcavalcade.com/tickets/
To view silent auction items and participate, view: https://e.givesmart.com/events/uch/
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