Her newest work has grown quietly in its ambition, moving increasingly toward abstraction as the figurative aspects become less explicit. “When I was younger, it was kind of like, Look what I can do, look how pretty this can be, how acceptable. Here’s someone holding a purse.” She smiles. “The women in the paintings are getting more and more interior. I’m not trying to explain everything. I can set the stage, put the music on, light the candles, but I think people have their own ability to dissect what they want from art.”

Heidi Hahn, NOT YOUR WOMAN #8, 2025. Oil on canvas, 86 1/8 x 64 1/2 in.

Courtesy Michael Kohn Gallery. Photography is Karl Puchlik

Despite describing this as the hardest body of work she has ever made—in part because she originally started it for a show at Mitchell-Innes & Nash’s Chelsea gallery, which then closed—the paintings Hahn shows me from her studio in East Williamsburg are confident, strong, and fascinating. There are undercurrents of Mark Rothko, Christina Ramberg, and Philip Guston.

A lot of the women in these paintings are in the process of becoming rather than complete, Hahn explains. One is imprisoned. One is built up on pink legs, has a tank-like torso, a pushed-back head, and a pink box that Hahn refers to as a skirt being pulled over the central form. Another is set against a saturated, pure orange—Hahn’s favorite color—holding a protective stance. “A friend of mine said, ‘it looks like she’s in a straight-jacket.’ Oh, God, it’s not that, but it’s definitely something where they’re putting their hands up and saying, ‘I’m here. I’m sitting here and I’m within myself.’”