Born: September 6, 2001, Bozeman, Montana
Based in: Lower East Side, New York City
Pronouns: Any of them — “we fluid”
Website: hmacstudios.myportfolio.com
Instagram: @hmacsauz | Lookbook: @whatsgooditshmac
Representation: whatsgooditshmac LLC
Biography
Raised in Bozeman, Montana, Hmac first learned to paint alongside her great-grandfather in a basement studio filled with carved wooden ducks and oil-stained palettes. Art came early, but it came back hard later. After a childhood shaped by instability and a move to live with her aunt and uncle at 13, drawing became an escape hatch. By high school, she was painting pizza shop murals and earning superlatives like best dressed and most artistic—signs of where things were heading.
At 17, she left Montana for Parsons in New York. The move cracked something open. Freed from small-town repetition, she started drawing what she knew: her homies. The ones back home. Doing the dumb, raw, good stuff that made them feel real. Those memories—the resentment, the nostalgia—started showing up in every piece. And slowly, she started to honor the world she came from instead of running from it.
Now post-graduation, Hmac is still in the city, running her rooftop studio on the Lower East Side. No official studio, no grants—just a saw, some spray paint, and a skyline.
Artistic Practice
Hmac’s world is made of homies. Characters caught mid-motion, laughing, smoking, chilling, half-falling out of their own outlines. She works fast and loose, layering pen, paint, and spray on whatever material she can find—but mostly wood. Spray paint has become her go-to for its vibrancy and speed, matched with acrylic markers for detail. There’s no master plan—just rhythm, memory, and energy.
The work is loud but rooted: beer cans, Montana trains, pickup trucks, bonfires, backyards, and bridges. A style she calls “wacky, country, fluid, and swag.” It doesn’t try to be slick. It’s cartoonish, but intentional. Nostalgic, but not naive. She pulls from old comedy movies—Hot Rod, Joe Dirt, Superbad—and from her real-life circle of friends, family, and found kin.
What makes it hit is scale. These aren’t notebook doodles. They’re full-body cutouts, wall-sized comics, homies that spill off the edge of wood slabs. She wants them to pop off the wall, literally.
Notable Works & Exhibitions
Her first painting, “Toe Cheese,” was done on a wood slab found in Bushwick and painted in a shared bedroom. That started it. From there came “Smoke Smoke”, a six-foot acrylic portrait that people still argue is either a friend or a self-portrait.
In 2024, she built her first woodcut, “Homie in the Hand,” and turned down a $500 offer to sell it. Months later, the same piece sold for $5,000. That moment stuck with her—it proved that knowing your value isn’t just talk.
Her follow-up, “Can o Wormz,” another large-scale woodcut, was shown at RECAST [Between Faces n Frames] in April and will be on view again at Neighbors (May 2025).
Selected Exhibitions
- Neighbors (w/ Peter Arkle), NYC – May 8, 2025
- Melted City 5, Blanc Gallery, Quezon City, PH – Jan 2025
- HMAC Open Studio Gallery, NYC – Mar 2025
- Utopia, KB Gallery, Brooklyn – Sept–Oct 2024
- Recast, NYC – Apr 2024
- CRIB Show x Sculpture Garden, NYC – May 2024
- Parsons Illustration Senior Show – Apr–May 2024
- Parsons Animation Festival (Founder, Curator) – May 2024
- The House Down Gallery, NYC – 2022
- Poler Outdoorstuff, Portland – 2022
She’s also worked with Poler Outdoor Stuff, Bigfoot Magazine, The New School Free Press, and curated shows through her own label, whatsgooditshmac.
Links & Press
Own Words/Studio Tour
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