Sensing Wonder: Artwork by Cathy Ryan
Sensing Wonder celebrates the life and work of Cathy Ryan, a longtime MCBA artist, Artist Collective member, former Board Chair, major champion, and dear friend.
Cathy’s life and work celebrate creative reflection on urban nature, and the bonds forged in creative community. “Ultimately, my work is about forging a stronger bond with the earth and finding a connection to place,” Ryan writes. “It’s about paying attention—to a single moment, a thought, an impression, an experience. It’s what the photographer Paul Caponigro describes as ‘sensing the thread which holds all things together.’”
We invite you to visit the Open Book Literary Commons for an exhibition celebrating her work and honoring the incredible impact Cathy made through her art in our community and beyond.
Visit the exhibition during Open Book’s open hours, Tuesday–Friday, 9am–9pm and Saturday–Monday, 9am–6pm.
Free and open to the public
WhereOpen Book Literary Commons
WhenJanuary 25, 2025–March 23, 2025
ReceptionFriday, January 31; 6–8pm
Cathy Ryan
(March 27, 1945 - October 5, 2024)
A lifelong artist and advocate for art and the connections it fosters, Cathy received well-deserved recognition for her thoughtful and beautifully crafted artist’s books and prints. In 2022, Cathy was selected as the Minnesota Book Artist Award winner for her artist’s book Chronicle, which beautifully captures the tension between the personal and the universal experience of our first Covid pandemic year. She received two Jerome/MCBA Book Arts Fellowships, and in 2015 co-curated the exhibition The Contained Narrative: Defining the Contemporary Artist’s Book, which was presented in MCBA’s Main Gallery. Cathy was awarded two artist residencies: in 2014 at the Anderson Center for Interdisciplinary Studies, Red Wing, MN; and in 2018 at Künstlerhaus, Salzburg, Austria. Her work was exhibited both nationally and internationally and is included in private and public collections including the Minnesota Historical Society, Hennepin County Library Special Collections, and the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee Libraries Special Collections. She completed a bachelor’s degree in art from San Francisco State University, and a post baccalaureate certificate in Print, Paper, Book from Minneapolis College of Art and Design.
Upcoming Exhibitions
