Mary Heilmann: Water Way,” the artist’s first solo exhibition at an East End institution, and “Joel Mesler: Miles of Smiles,” his first museum show here, will open at Guild Hall on Sunday and continue through Oct. 26. Both Ms. Heilmann and Mr. Mesler are from California, and both have water elements in their work.
Throughout her life, Ms. Heilmann has consistently chosen to live close to water. Growing up in both Los Angeles and the Bay Area, she was a competitive diver as a teenager, and later became involved in the beatnik and surfer cultures. All of it has influenced her work. She moved to New York City in 1968 and bought a house in Bridgehampton in 1995.
Ms. Heilmann, who has characterized her paintings as autobiographical, often gives them titles that offer hints as to her intentions. For example, she translates waves into geometric, hard-edge forms and compares this to the way a diver must think about the body’s physical geometry when planning a dive.
“Mary’s show is a project she has wanted to stage for a long time, and I think that what’s going to be nice and surprising is that she has elements of ceramics, watercolor, paintings. What you’ll see is how she’s taken this theme of water and really expanded it in all aspects of her practice,” said Melanie Crader, the museum’s director and curator of visual arts. “It spans over 40 years, and there are over 40 works in the exhibition.”
While some of the paintings in “Water Way” are clear references to waves, in other cases, such as “Psychedelic Night Wave,” it’s the title, rather than the image, that is pertinent. Some of the wall works are mixed-media, such as the acrylic and papier-mâché, pulp-on-wood-and-panel “Broken Wave,” from 2022.
Some works have never been shown before, others have been in collections and rarely exhibited.
“Mary Heilmann: Starry Night,” an early body of sculptural work, is on exhibit at Dia Beacon, and “Mary Heilmann: Long Line” opened at the Whitney Museum of American Art in April. That show features a social-space environment with a large mural and seating designed by the artist. In the fall, “Mary Heilmann: Works on Paper, 1973-2019” will be published by Hauser & Wirth Publishers, with an essay by Jo Applin, an art historian, and a personal reflection by Ilana Savdie, an artist.
On Sunday at 6 p.m., Jacqueline Humphries and Stanley Whitney, artists, and Laura Phipps, associate curator at the Whitney, will discuss Ms. Heilmann’s work and legacy. Tickets are $25, $22.50 for members.
Mr. Mesler is not only an artist but also a former art dealer, a collector, a connoisseur, an archivist, and an artistic collaborator. After moving from California to East Hampton in 2017, he opened the Rental Gallery on Newtown Lane, which, though now closed, was cited by Jennifer Landes in this newspaper as adding “a bit of mischief and delight to our summer and year.”
The same can be said of “Joel Mesler: Miles of Smiles.” The exhibition essentially brings to Guild Hall his office and studio, where he lives and works among art and personal effects that inhabit every square inch of his space. While Guild Hall’s gallery isn’t as cluttered, there are plenty of artworks by Mr. Mesler, and others by artists in his collection, including Sheree Hovsepian, Rashid Johnson, and Francesco Clemente.
As for mischief and delight, a centerpiece of the installation is a massive wooden desk on which sit belongings, including a photograph of his parents and a telephone. During the installation of the show the artist took time to surprise a visitor by lifting up the desktop, to which all the objects are glued. Inside are a mattress and reading lights — which, at least for “Seinfeld” fans, call to mind George Costanza’s desk with a hidden bunk. Mr. Mesler said he planned to spend some time inside the desk while people are in the gallery.
He illuminates universal themes by filtering them through autobiography, humor, self-deprecation, and surprising compositional juxtapositions, often employing graphic patterns and motifs, elaborate typography, and personal iconography. He has explored the power of acceptance, allowing emotions — as well as the cultural forms in which they become entangled — to exist at the center of his projects.
Like “Almond Zigmund: Wading Room,” the previous show in the space, “Miles of Smiles” will function as a meeting place, with the artist often on hand.
“When you visit Joel’s studio, you are pulled into his orbit, and the show is a nice way to involve the viewer in a way that is like an art experience,” said Ms. Crader. “Not immersive, but definitely something you can use and participate in — a visually interesting environment.”
Ms. Crader and Mr. Mesler worked together over the past year to determine the nature of the exhibition. The gallery’s west wall, which is completely covered with painted canvas on wallpaper, is among its key elements. The recurring image expands on another of Mr. Mesler’s works, a painting of Hoya hearts, plants known for their distinctive heart-shape leaves. “I took the gesture of the vines from Louise Bourgeois’s spiders,” said the artist. The north wall will be hung, salon-style, with artworks.
“Joel probably won’t be here every day all the time, but he’s welcome to come whenever we’re open,” said Ms. Crader.
Working together, she and Mr. Mesler developed a series of participatory programs based on his practice, to be presented in August. The first, set for Aug. 10 from 2 to 4, is “Coffee With Friends Old and New (This Could Be You).” Visitors will be invited to have coffee with the artist, who drinks a lot of it. (Goat, cow, and almond milk will be available.) “If the weather is nice, we might even go outside,” Mr. Mesler said. The cost is $5 with unlimited refills.
Subsequent programs are “Storytime With Joel (and Questions and Comments)” (Aug. 16); “Art Social: Shrink Session With Joel Mesler” (Aug. 18), and “Portrait Painting With Joel (Don’t Stop Painting)” (Aug. 23).
In conjunction with the exhibition, Smile Shop, an artist-designed pop-up in Guild Hall’s lobby gallery, will feature merchandise designed by Mr. Mesler, including charm necklaces, wallpaper, plushies, robes, and more. It will be open for the duration of the show.
Both exhibitions were organized by Ms. Crader, with Philippa Content, museum manager and registrar, and Claire Hunter, museum coordinator and curatorial associate.
