Bibiana Huang Matheis

October 6 - November 1, 2021

“Do Not Enter Waterways” offers commentary on the excessive amount of discarded plastic that is choking the world’s oceans, lakes and rivers.  Plastic breaks into smaller and smaller particles as it decomposes, a process that can take up to 500 years.  These tiny specks of plastic make their way into fish, shellfish, table salt, drinking water and more - resulting in the average human consuming over 40 pounds of plastic in their lifetime.  (That’s like eating one credit card a week.)

Huang Matheis gives voice to the planet and its inhabitants, the plants, animals, earth, air, and water, which if suddenly granted the power of speech would certainly plead with us to stop choking them.  To save them and as a result save ourselves.  This cry for change comes in the form of beauty.  Bibiana transforms thrown away plastic objects like take-out containers, egg cartons, liquid hand-soap bottles, etc. (all items that humanity lived without until the mid-1960’s) into delicate, elegant works of art.  As a form of meditation she paints freeform shapes while her mind focuses on the planet’s water.  In some designs she imposes a heart, symbolic of love, the love of nature, love of what we have, love of what we have lost, and the love of preserving what remains.  Huang Matheis knows her art can not reverse this catastrophic environmental damage.  This installation is simply her “meek protest against the insanity of this unnecessary pollutant.”  

Bibiana Huang Mathe is an artist, fine arts photographer and curator. She studied at the  Maryland School of Art and Design and at the Corcoran School of Art.  She has been active in the arts since the late 1970s. Her work has appeared in major exhibits and publications in the US and Europe, including New York City, Chicago, Beijing and Berlin. Her  work is hanging on permanent display at the National Museum of African American History and Culture Smithsonian Institution, in Washington, D.C.    

Huang Mathe frequently combines installation art, collage and photography. She is the  recipient of the 2015 ArtsWestchester ‘50 for 50’ Arts Award honoring 50  Outstanding artists on the 50-year Anniversary of the organization. She was also honored with the 2014 Dutchess County, New York, Executive Arts Award - Individual Artist. She is a frequent panelist in art forums, including the Hudson Valley Museum of Modern Art: Curating for the Public 2017. In 2019 she was an  artist in residence at the Fresh Winds Art Biennale in Iceland.  

She has curated a number of exhibitions in the Hudson Valley.  This includes the successful series of art exhibitions titled “Meeting Past” at the Akin Library & Museum in Pawling, New York.  She also exhibits and curates at the Mid-Hudson Heritage Center, the Howland Cultural Center in Beacon and the Hammond Museum in North Salem, New York.  For the Hammond Museum she has curated a dozen virtual art exhibitions with artists from around the world and she is widely recognized as a strong advocate for the arts in the region.  In 2020/21 her work was selected for  the prestigious exhibition Symbiosis and Coexistence: 11th "From Lausanne to Beijing". Beijing, China, International Fiber Art Biennale.