Catherine holding Blue City (It's OK Baby) by the red poles at Grand Canal Square, Dublin 2.
Biography
Born in Dublin, Catherine Ryan is a mixed media artist with a background in glass design at the National College of Art and Design. Her abstract cityscapes celebrate cities as multi-layered centres of humanity. Various objects are wired, glued, nailed onto the flat surface of the canvas, adding texture and blurring the lines between painting and sculpture. These fragments are incorporated into the imagined landscape where there is space for every conceivable shape and for all colours. Catherine’s exhibition history includes the Royal Hibernian Academy, RUA RED and Limerick City Gallery of Art. Her work has also travelled to the UK, France and the USA. In 2020 she joined the artists’ collective Nua Collective. Catherine is a professional member of Visual Artists Ireland.
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Artist's Statement
My art is inspired by people, cities, travel, looking at the world with fresh eyes, playing with materials to see what happens. Since a young age I have loved bright colours; they are full of vitality and joy. A sense of humour is also important. Humour is subversive because it's spontaneous and mischievous. It makes us humans think about things that are taboo or not openly discussed.
The main idea behind my work is that contemporary life is complex yet there is an overall unity to things, a pattern. I use objects that I find while out walking, while some items are donated. These readymade materials add an immediacy that cannot be created by simply drawing or painting the object. They allow for a quick expression of ideas and shapes when they are transplanted onto the canvas. I use paint to connect these items with lines, forming an interdependent grid system, a mapped cityscape.
The main idea behind my work is that contemporary life is complex yet there is an overall unity to things, a pattern. I use objects that I find while out walking, while some items are donated. These readymade materials add an immediacy that cannot be created by simply drawing or painting the object. They allow for a quick expression of ideas and shapes when they are transplanted onto the canvas. I use paint to connect these items with lines, forming an interdependent grid system, a mapped cityscape.