Crawford Municipal Art Gallery is delighted to present a retrospective of the artist Pat Moran. To mark the tenth anniversary of his death over forty-five works have been assembled to provide a comprehensive overview of this fascinating and much respected artist.
Pat Moran's work centres on an almost 'romantic' vision of cityscapes and provides an enthralling and very personal record of the changing urban environments of Dublin and Cork. His work is lucid, responsive and communicates an intimacy of place and a real affection for lived in, often shabby and neglected spaces of urbanity.
Pat Moran was born in Port Laoise in 1961. He studied Fine Art Painting at Dun Laoghaire School of Art and Design and at the National College of Art and Design from 1982 - 1983. His working life was mostly spent in Dublin in various studios and derelict buildings throughout the city. In addition he spent a year painting in Italy in 1984 - 1985 and travelled in Mexico studying mural painting in 1986.
He exhibited his work regularly in group shows and had his first one-man exhibition Local Colour in the Temple Bar Gallery in 1988. He was involved in a number of community art and mural projects throughout Dublin. In 1990, Moran moved to Cork, as part of the Triskel Arts Centre's Artists in Residence scheme and worked from a studio in the Cork Artists' Collective. His work matured and developed considerably during this period culminating with his second solo show at the Triskel Arts Centre in 1991. He continued to live in Cork and became involved in the Artist in Prison scheme as a teacher in Port Laoise Prison. Pat was in the process of moving back to Dublin when he died on Sherkin Island, Whit Weekend 1992.
This exhibition, which will tour to Dunamaire Arts Centre, Port Laoise will raise the public profile of this very accomplished artist and will provide a definitive record of Pat Moran's work through the publication of an extensive catalogue published by Gandon with an essay by Aidan Dunne.
"Pat Moran painted pictures and he painted pictures of what he knew and experienced. The honesty to paint cars - no one paints cars in the romance language of cityscape. Giddily leaning lampposts clawing in to blue and green streetscapes - black and white expressions of inner city grubbiness. Pat painted as he lived with vitality and directness, and of course in the usual confusions of our being" (Richard Gorman, 2001)
