Michael Hecht's Gallery

I approach art-making as a noble and timeless means of community- a gesture of friendship to kindred spirits with a mutual tendency toward contemplation and dreaming.  Through depictions of the outer physical body I attempt to candidly express the inner passions.  Various extreme emotional states such as anguish, joy, ecstasy, sorrow, desire, etc. can violently cause one to temporarily go outside her/himself, for example: to be "out of one's mind" or "out of body".  I am interested in the notion that when someone is in such an altered state he/she is more disposed to true communication with others and the universe at large, for, in such a state the self is vulnerable and open to an inward and outward flow of unguarded sharing.  Furthermore, two people are potentially in a pure communal state when in shared friendship or laughter and when making love.  In my works I am continuously meditating on the perpetual struggle between asserting individuation and a desire and willingness to dissolve/disintegrate the integrity of "self".