Installation by Rian Keranne
Reception: Sept. 5, 6 - 9pm
Exhibition: Aug. 8 - Sept. 20

This work, Arabesque, (a tribute of sorts to Henri Matisse’s use of dominating pattern to abstract the picture plane) stems from my respect and fascination for wallpaper.

William Morris hand printed wallpapers to peeling remnants preserved in homes from the 1800’s are all stimulus for my imagery. Pattern is orderly and obsessive, decorative and colorful, and subject to fashion. Often insanely dominant in a room I believe the role of décor in the home to be symbolic witness to the human condition. On one hand we have our instincts, on the other the social constructs we apply to control. Nature, the act of being natural, the fertility, fecundity of the earth is symbolized in the way we decorate our homes with motifs and images of the exterior. It is one of the ways in which we impose our own dictums on our surrounds, a subject that intrigues me.

-Rian Kerrane

Born in Galway, Ireland, in 1968 Rian Kerrane received her BA in Fine Arts Degree from the University of Ulster at Belfast in 1991. She located to the United States in 1994 and earned her MFA from the University of New Orleans in 1997. Currently residing in Denver, Colorado, Kerrane is Assistant Professor and Area Head for the Sculpture Program at the University of Colorado Denver.

Rian is an advocate for the arts and believes that art and education are uniquely associated. Her primary interests lie in sculpture and multi-media installation. She was pivotal in the development of the Western Cast Iron Art Alliance and hosting the inaugural Western Cast Iron Art Conference in Denver in 2008. Kerrane’s work has shown in sculpture gardens and galleries in the United States, Italy, Mexico and Ireland. Most recently she exhibited in Ireland during the Errigal Arts Festival and at the Florence Biennale, Italy. Prior to that she has shown at JUST Sculpture Tour, Jackson, Tennessee. She was awarded Peoples Choice for her work exhibited in Art at Northlake Park, Orlando, Florida in 2004 and received both Best of Show and the Peoples Choice Award in the 2nd Annual Florida Outdoor Sculpture Competition in 2002. Returning to Ireland in 1999 and 2002 respectively, Kerrane was artist in residence at Cosan Glas, an environmental sculpture trail during the Errigal Arts Festival, and at the Flax Art Studio’s International Residency Programme in Belfast. She also co-designed and teaches a cross-disciplinary, site-specific art course as a summer programme for the Burren College of Art in County Clare, Ireland.

Kerrane collaborated on an installation series titled The Deluge Series from 2000 -2007. Exhibited widely, The Deluge Series showed at the 2001 Biennial at Atlanta’s Contemporary Art Center and in 2002 at the Engine Room Gallery, Belfast, Northern Ireland. Recent exhibitions are Consensual Nonreproduction at Fort Collins Museum of Contemporary Art, Colorado in 2005, Domestic Love Tokens at SPACES Gallery in Cleveland, Ohio, 2006. 2006 also saw Kerrane participate in Edge va a Mexico at the Centro Cultural, Casa Borda, Taxco, Mexico and present at Escuela Nacional de Artes Plasticas, University of Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico.

Her work can be seen online at www.riankerrane.com