WEEKENDS : JUly 12th-Aug 10TH 2025

HIDING IN PLAIN SITE

Retrospective of an Unknown Artist

UNION HALL GALLERY | SAN DIEGO | CALIFORNIA

EXHIBITION

Hiding on Plain Site is both a retrospective and a debut—a rare window into the creative world of Joseph A. Henseler, a multidisciplinary artist unveiling more than 30 years of unseen work. This expansive solo exhibition traces his lifelong journey across diverse media, including sculpture, painting, stained glass, copper, weaving, photography, poetry, and site-specific installations.

Working largely outside the spotlight, Henseler has developed a distinctive voice rooted in the belief that art can be made from anything and found everywhere. His pieces—created from reclaimed, found, and everyday materials—challenge conventional boundaries, inviting viewers to reconsider where and how art can exist.

“Show up anywhere and look at the surrounding nature; there is art.
Discarded paper, there is art.
Look at the lighting after dark; there is art.
Focus on anything at all, and you will find art.

The artist’s job is to follow through and show what is often already in the open.”

— Joseph Henseler

 

This exhibition features over 80 works, including original pieces and limited-edition prints. None of them were commissioned or computer-generated. Instead, they form a deeply personal archive—an exploration of materials, memory, and meaning.

More than just a retrospective, Hiding on Plain Site acts as a prologue—a glimpse of what’s to come from an artist committed to presence, perception, and purpose through creation.

Media Resources Here

ARTIST STATEMENT

I see the outside world as an infinite collection of possibilities—colors, words, and materials waiting to be shaped into expressions of the inner human experience. When I enter the artistic mindset, everything around me comes alive with vibrating energy. The impulse to create arises from my deeply human desire to share what lives within me. It's almost as though the effect comes before the cause—creativity comes without any need to explain why.

I work with any material without interest in a specific style, as all materials can be shaped in response to that inner urge. I see something, feel something, and then create. Since childhood, I’ve believed that this approach to life and art is a valuable human antidote to the increasing dominance of technology. Artmaking helps us retain our humanity and connect authentically with one another.

Whether I’m building, painting, sculpting, drawing, writing, wrapping, placing, installing, interpreting, producing, or perceiving art allows me to translate the fleeting beauty of our impermanent yet magical lives into something lasting and meaningful.

“Artmaking allows us to retain our humanity in a world increasingly dominated by technology. It is a way of seeing, producing, and sharing what it means to be exquisitely human. Through any material, in any moment, art captures our fleeting but magical existence.”


— Joseph A. Henseler

  • WATERCOLOR

  • SCULPTURE

  • MIXED MEDIA

  • PAINTINGS

  • PHOTOGRAPHY

  • GLASSWORK

BIOGRAPHY

Joseph A. Henseler was born in 1971 in Rota, Spain, into a U.S. Navy family. He grew up in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where his passion for the arts emerged early at the age of 6, through drawing, drumming, and poetry. At 14, he joined his high school’s marching, concert, and jazz bands. In 1987, he was selected to tour Europe with the Sound of America Honor Band, sparking a lifelong fascination with architecture, design, and cultural expression.

After this experience, he enrolled in two college-level courses while on tour, which resulted in him writing a paper comparing European and American architecture based on his observations from the tour. He also enrolled in technical drawing and art classes.

Joseph studied architecture at Ball State University, where he spent seven years exploring the intersection of design and lived experience. His thesis, Art and Architecture – The Value of Placemaking, became a built project in the Indiana woods, constructed from earth, straw, and stone. During this time, he also began painting, writing poetry, and experimenting with materials, ultimately producing his first abstract paintings, sculptures, and building models for academic presentation and eventually for money, including a wood and plaster model permanently displayed at Yeshiva University in NYC.

In 1996, Joseph moved to Julian, California, and soon began working in the art studio of renowned artist James Hubbelland the architecture office of Drew Hubbell. These years marked a turning point: immersed in a working studio environment, Joseph learned sculpture, stained glass, tile mosaic, blacksmithing, ceramics, and metalwork. He traveled extensively, documented his experiences through photography and journaling, and produced a wide range of multidisciplinary artworks.

Following the 2003 Cedar Fire, Joseph helped design and construct an off-grid, fire-resistive home in Cuyamaca, CA—later featured in an award-winning documentary on sustainable design. In 2005, he moved to San Diego, where he taught studio design at the Newschool of Architecture and stained glass at the Art Academy of San Diego. He became a licensed contractor and founded DUENDE DNC Inc., designing and building residential projects with integrated art for over a decade.

After closing DUENDE in 2019 during the COVID-19 pandemic, Joseph recommitted to his path as a fine artist. He now works from his studio in Kearny Mesa and is a member of the Visual Arts Association (London). His current focus is reviving and exhibiting past work while creating new pieces that reflect the depth of a life lived through—and for—art.

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