February 19, 2007     

Michael x. Ryan: Above Ground

March 2- April 14, 2007

Urban stains are transformed into sublime architectural installations

Chicago --- Above Ground, an exhibition of architectural installations and map drawings by artist Michael x. Ryan will be on display at Alfedena Gallery, 434 W. Ontario, Chicago, from March 2 – April 14, 2007. An opening reception for the artist will be held on Friday, March 2 from 5-8 p.m. and an additional public reception for the River North Gallery district will be held on March 16, 5-8 p.m. The exhibition is free and open to the public.

Ryan’s obsessive, circuitous mappings of his daily travels absorb one into the complex invisible matrixes that people create unconsciously as they move through the world. His architectural installations based on the patterns of random stains found on urban sidewalks reveal an individual’s transitory existence.

The exhibition Above Ground features three vertical architectural installations evoking altar pieces in which delicate, horizontal patterns of anonymous spills have been made into upright, three-dimensional reliefs of minimalist beauty. Also on view are process driven drawings from the artist’s 2005 residency in Krems, Austria in which his daily travels through this medieval European city were recorded through laborious networks of lines on prosaic tourist maps, transforming them into highly personal, abstract journals. Michael x. Ryan’s work is in both private and public collections including those of the Art Institute of Chicago, MacArthur Foundation and Everson Museum. He teaches at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago where he has been the recipient of the Distinguished Faculty Award.