“His images, shot from the open side of a helicopter, focus on the after-effects of drought, wildfire, and human profit. The works, he said, amount to a warning about our environmental future, even as they insist on beauty.”

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“Der aus Dinslaken in Nordrhein-Westfalen stammende langjährige Wahl-Kalifornier ist für seine künstlerischen Luftaufnahmen von Dürre- und Feuerschäden bekannt, die den Klimawandel vor Augen führen. Seine Fotos verkauft der Künstler nun für einen guten Zweck: Der Erlös von mehreren Ausstellungen soll den Brandopfern zukommen.” Born in Dinslaken in North Rhine-Westphalia, the long-time Californian is well-known for his artistic aerial photographs of drought and fire damage that highlight climate change. The artist now sells his photos for a good cause: the proceeds from several exhibitions are to be donated to the victims of the fire.

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“Die Fotografien von Thomas Heinser erzeugen eine irritierende Paradoxie, ganz so wie Landkarten: Je größer der Maßstab, desto tiefer schauen wir in eine Mikrowelt. Und auch in die Tiefe unseres Körpers.” The photographs by Thomas Heinser create an intersting paradox, much like maps: the larger the scale, the deeper we look into a micro-world.

“Sie erinnern an Streifen auf den Gemälden von Mark Rothko, die seine Bilder in Segmente von verschiedenen Farben teilen.” They are reminiscent of stripes in the paintings by Mark Rothko, who divides his paintings into segments of different colors.

“Nun finden sich die Makro- und Mikro-Welten durch den Blick eines Fotografen zusammen, um den schöpferischen Überblick zu gewinnen. Und so wird eine Verflechtung der göttlichen Schöpfung mit der menschlichen Gestaltung in einem Muster offenbart.” Now, the macro and micro worlds come together through the eyes of a photographer to gain the creative overview. And an intertwining of the divine creation with human creation are revealed in a pattern.

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“Heinsers Fotos sind vor allem ein ästhetisches Erlebnis, aber unter der Schönheit liegt auch eine klimapolitische Botschaft verborgen.” Heinser’s photographs are above all an aesthetic experience, but a Climapolitic message is hidden under the beauty.

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“Heinsers Fotos sind vor allem ein ästhetisches Erlebnis, aber unter der Schönheit liegt auch eine klimapolitische Botschaft verborgen.” Heinser’s photographs are above all an aesthetic experience, but a Climapolitic message is hidden under the beauty.

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“Seine Fotos sehen aus wie Gemälde. Er bringt die Luftaufnahmen nicht nur in die ehemalige Heimatstadt, sondern illustriert damit gleichzeitig den menschlichen Raubbau an der Natur und somit die Auswirkungen des Klimawandels. Die Bilder sind Anlass für das Team von Geoscopia, die Luftaufnahmen genauer zu betrachten und zu erklären, was man darauf alles genau erkennen kann. Die Bilder sind Anlass für das Team von Geoscopia, die Luftaufnahmen genauer zu betrachten und zu erklären, was man darauf alles genau erkennen kann.” His photographs look like paintings. Not only does he bring aerial photographs to his former hometown, he also illustrates the human exploitation of nature and thus the effects of climate change. These pictures are the reason for the team of Geoscopia to look more closely at the aerial images and explain what can be seen.

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“Das Bild ist nicht in Mischtechnik gemalt, sondern die Fotografie einer Saline im südlichen San Francisco Bay, Aufgenommen aus einem Hubschrauber in einem Winkel von annähernd 90 Grad.” The picture is not painting in mixed technique, but the photograph of a salt pond in the southern San Francisco Bay, captured from a helicopter at an angle of approximately 90 degrees.

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“Die Bilder zeigen die Natur und das was der Mensch daraus macht, bzw. gemacht hat. Zu sehen sind mehrspurige Straßen die von Brücken gekreuzt werden, Rollbahnen und kalifornische Landschaften, die von der Dürre gezeichnet sind.” The pictures show nature and what human beings make of it, which can be seen in multi – lane roads crossed by bridges, runways and Californian landscapes marked by drought.

“Beeindruckende und wunderschöne Bilder ferner Landschaften, die wie Grafiken oder Gemälde wirken.” Impressive and beautiful images of distant landscapes that look like graphics or paintings.

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“Das Bild ist nicht in Mischtechnik gemalt, sondern die Fotografie einer Saline im südlichen San Francisco Bay, Aufgenommen aus einem Hubschrauber in einem Winkel von annähernd 90 Grad.” The picture is not painting in mixed technique, but the photograph of a salt pond in the southern San Francisco Bay, captured from a helicopter at an angle of approximately 90 degrees.

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“Thomas Heinser’s Arbeiten haben eine durchas politische Dimension. Viele dokumtieren den Eingriff des Menschen in die Natur. Sie berichten von Verwüstungen und Verletzungen, von den grossflächigen Auswirkungen der Klimaveränderung. Aber sie sind keine politischen statements in einer Zeit und in einem Land, wo wissenschaftliche Erkenntnisse als “fake news” dargestellt werden. Dennoch regen seine Bilder einen Denkprozess an, der über die ästhetische Wahrnehmung weit hinausgeht.” Thomas Heinser’s work has a political dimension. Many people document human intervention in nature. They report devastation and injuries, the large-scale effects of climate change. But they are not political statements at a time and in a country where scientific insights are presented as “fake news”. His images stimulate a process of thought that goes far beyond aesthetic perception.

“SpektakulärLandschaften während der letzten Dürre im Kalifornishchen Central Valley, ausgetrocknete Felder, Salinen und fruchtbare Lanschaften wählt er sich zu seiner Aufgabe. So entstehen Bilder mit beeindruckenden Eigenschaften und Lichtstimmungen. Sie illustrieren aber auch die Auswirkungen des Klimawandels und des menschlichen Raubbaus an der Natur.” He chooses spectacular landscapes during the last drought in California’s Central Valley, with dried out fields, salt marshes and fertile landscapes. This creates images with impressive lighting and features. However, they also illustrate the effects of climate change and the human impact on nature.

“Die Bilder sind abstrakt, ihre Texturen scheinen zum Teil in Ölmalerei, zum Teil in reliefartiger Mischtechnik gehalten zu sein. Aber dieser Eindruck täuscht. Bei aller künstlerischer Ästhetik, bei aller Farb- und Formkomposition.”The pictures are abstract, their textures seem partly an oil painting, partly a relief-like mixed technique. But this impression deceives, with artistic aesthetic, color, form and composition.

“Schön, verwirrend, die Grenzen von Malerei und Fotografie bewusst in Frage stellend und in ihrer Aussage doch eindeutig: ‘Seht her, was wir mit unser Welt machen!’”

Beautiful, confusing, deliberately questioning the boundaries of painting and photography, yet clear in the message: “Look what we are doing to our world.”

“Das Bild sieht aus wie eine Zeichnung, als habe Heinser das weiße Papier mit einem Graphitstift schraffiert. Tatsächlich sind die schwarzen Striche auf weiß-grauem Grund die Reste verkohlter Bäume auf Aschenboden.”The image looks like a drawing, as if Heinser marked the white paper with a graphite pencil. In fact, the black lines on a white-gray background are the remains of charred trees on ashes.

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“Thomas Heinser’s landscapes remind me of mid-century color field paintings. They become so abstract that they lose almost all recognition of anything natural all together. It makes the viewer stop to question what they are looking at.”

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“He was admiring the beautiful color palettes of the salt ponds on the edge of the bay. Leaning from a doorless helicopter, Heinser went on to capture the painterly quality of these ponds that are ever changing due to evaporation.”

“Heinser hopes the images offer a new perspective on California and give people a reason to talk about the environment. “

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“To get the mesmerizing shots, 58-year-old Heinser leans out of a helicopter that has the door taken off.”

“Breathtaking shots.” 

“The collection highlights how a combination of factors have transformed and diminished the face of this once-flourishing landscape.”

“The devastating impact of drought and fire upon California’s barren landscape has been revealed in a striking collection of aerial photographs.”

“The barren landscape of California, hit by drought, fire and industry, has been shown off in a spectacular photo collection.”

“The 58-year-old photographer, who lives in northern California, has been cataloguing his changing homeland in the shocking images taken from above.”

“Heinser’s photo series shows just why the rainfall is so necessary.”

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“Heinser has been going out in helicopters and taking breathtaking overhead shots of what climate change has done to California. Although his photos are taken at over a thousand feet in the air, they often have the vivid, otherworldly feel of photomicrographs.”

“Heinser strives for a minimum of post-processing, and all the photos in his Reduziert series have one thing in common: They all showcase the results of man’s intervention with nature and the apocalyptic effects of human-wrought climate change.”

“When people look at his art, they often aren’t sure if they’re looking at a photograph or a vivid watercolor. “

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“Thomas Heinser has been documenting the effects of the drought on California’s terrain for the past three years, producing a series of aerial perspectives that make clear the extent of environmental impact.” 

“Heinser’s record of the Bay Area’s extensive salt evaporation ponds is particularly evocative. The parched texture of the ponds comes to the foreground, even though his photos are taken from hundreds of feet above.”

“There is a somber cast to all the images, contributing to the surreal qualities of the photographs. Heinser renders these landscapes otherworldly and unfamiliar and, in so doing, draws our attention to the larger question he is grappling with: What will the consequences be if we continue to be disengaged from the transformations taking place in our environment?”

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“A stark, startling, but curiously gorgeous series of reminders.” 

“The landscapes appear flattened and unreal from Heinser’s sky-high perspective, some of them scarcely resembling real places at all, others reminiscent of nuclear ground zeroes or backdrops to freaky Goya paintings.”

“From a distance, a forest looks like a gray and black smear of static lines, while a range of hills looks like something you’ve crumbled up and thrown away.”

“Even as damaged as it is, there’s something ineffable about the Golden State landscape, and the sharp and provocative boundaries between one place and another.”

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“Thomas Heinser captures how drought, fire, and industry make abstractions of the landscape.”

“They capture California at its most diminished —from drought, from wildfire, and from human profit.”

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“As soon as a massive wildfire ended in Lake County, California, photographer Thomas Heinser got in a plane and started to document the strange beauty of the damage.”

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“The photos border on the surreal. Lake McClure has etched undulating rings like a dirty bathtub, each indicating where the water level once stood. Barren fields are etched with patterns left by irrigation wheels and other equipment. Hillsides are charred by fires. As beautiful as the photos are, Heinser hopes they prompt reflection on California’s environmental future.” 

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“His work is, by design, intended to create fresh vantage point with which to view our environment. His disorienting photographs present us with abstract, flattened and painterly visions of our world. Heinser presents us with the beauty of the visual patterns formed by the intersection of natural and constructed environments.”

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“The photographer’s latest pursuit involves capturing geographical shifts and the effects of the drought in his adopted state, from the Bay Area’s multihued salt evaporation ponds to fire-devastated Lake County, which he shot shortly after air space was reopened.”

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Die von ihm ausgewählten Motive haben eine versteckte Schönheit, die in seinen Bildern erst richtig zum Ausdruck kommt. His chosen motifs have a hidden beauty that is expressed in his pictures.

Sie sind sehr berührend, da Thomas Heinser in jedem dieser Porträts die Gefühle der jeweiligen Person einfängt.They are very touching, as Thomas Heinser captures the feelings of each person in each of these portraits.

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Amerikanischer Vernissage-Flair im Voswinckelshof: Ungewöhnlich viele 350 (!) Besucher genossen die Thomas Heinser Ausstellung Blickwinkel. American vernissage flair at the Voswinckelshof: Unusually numerous 350 (!) visitors enjoyed the Thomas Heinser exhibition “Blickwinkel”

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“Using documentary landscape techniques as their starting point, these three, inter-linked series transform terrestrial feats of engineering into abstracted, almost painterly compositions.”

“Thomas Heinser surveys the earth from above, finding the graphic intersection of nature and structure, of man and landscape—and recent changes to that landscape.”

“His concern about environmental change led him to document these changes in ways that bridge the binary of aerial distance and the poignant, on the ground realities that face humans and their contemporary lands.”
“By isolating landscape elements from such a distance, Heinser’s seemingly close-up captures paradoxically create the look of a painting’s blown-up detail. “

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“Überblick translates roughly as “over-view” and is an accurate take on both the photographer’s aerial vantage point and a greater notion of finding beauty in bridges, clover leafs, wind turbines, and other bits of infrastructure that are usually passed over in the discussion of architectural aesthetics.”

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