“The bigger the image, the finer the lines and the more detail possible with oil pastels,” says Mercedes. “Doing large faces, I was able to keep the details that I’m comfortable with. And also, it gave me the chance to really indulge in faces and expressions — that has always been my favorite part to draw, because that’s where all the emotion usually comes from. It’s a treat to be able to magnify that and really get into it on such a huge scale. And that’s not to say I don’t like human limbs, but I saved those for the pencil drawings.”

Monochromatic once more, the pencil drawings are sleeper cells, frozen in future tense. You set the alarm clock. So pull up a chair and push your imagination off the swing. Intuit your own sign language — they like to talk back. Smaller and fewer are the mixed media of pencil and pastel. Shaded backgrounds contrast brightened women for an emboldened effect, but not one the artist would generate solely with color pencils.

“Doing color drawings with pencils is very limiting, and they can be a real pain in the ass,” she says. “No matter how good you get, a color pencil can’t compete with an oil pastel stick in terms of brightness of color. And once you create a layer that’s too thick, you can’t go over it or lighten it again. With paints or oil pastels, of course you can — so in a way I felt like I was cheating. I could suddenly do all these things that I’d always painstakingly have to work around.”

As before, video art is installed in the gallery and titled after the exhibition. Filming was unscripted and footage amounted in hours, and so her collaborator was essential to the production.

“When my brother Ali gave me the music, which was shockingly perfect and maybe my favorite piece he composed for me so far, it was really easy to put it all together,” says Mercedes.

Together she unites them, these tangles of time in which women collapse and twist and corner themselves, all separately but in the same spaces, their consciousnesses bound by Ali’s sonorous score of violin, cello, clarinet, guitar, and other pieces. This is their third collaboration for an art exhibition.

Whistling Past the Graveyard (2008) began the habit with Ali Helnwein’s cyclical chord progression, the banjo pervasive among the merged instruments. The visuals of Whistling were arranged as modestly as the sound mix.

Livelier, East of Eden (2009) danced on vignettes and accelerated editing, for teamwork met reward. While Mercedes manipulated motion, Ali punctuated the soundtrack. Scales climbed and tumbled. Instruments ran back and forth and around each other. The outcome was charmingly comical and capricious.

Most crystallized is Temptation to Be Good. The spontaneity still sparkles and the intrigue invites and the motifs agree in a fellowship immemorial among the three films. Ascribe the feat to both the filmmaker and composer. Mercedes acknowledges this: “The music is an important part, and I’ll say it again: it’s ridiculously convenient to have a brother who is a composer.”

And while the Helnweins are conveniently artists, their work is not constructed on Easy Street. Art endures through revolution not revisit. This means continual conflict for Mercedes — with her creations, with herself — the compulsion crucial for generating life force and for quelling chaos. She thrives on diversity; she creates art and fiction; she even models and directs films for the fashion line, Ai for Ai, run by sisters, Carol and Elizabeth Ai.

“I think artists have to keep themselves entertained in order to do anything honestly,” she says. “I need to be fascinated with what I’m working on and curious about the outcome of every piece. I want to be intrigued by the stories of the characters I’m drawing. And technically, a work of art sometimes needs to be a battle, in order for me to even want to win.”

Temptation to Be Good is at the Merry Karnowsky Gallery in Los Angeles until December 11.

—– the artist —–

Mercedes Helnwein is a fine artist, novelist, and filmmaker. Her family of artists includes Gottfried Helnwein, violinist/composer Ali Helnwein, photographer Cyril Helnwein, and model/actress/musician Kojii Helnwein. Tempt yourself at http://www.mercedeshelnwein.com/