Through the activities of walking and looking Tynan identifies alternative landmarks in the city, places to rest the eyes that give rise to contemplation. She observes and informally records visual quirks in her surroundings and such vagaries are later bestowed with temporal emphasis through the medium of paint. In the cracks of a pebble dashed wall and across a layer of uneven plaster, real world surfaces and textures appear elevated through keen observation. She focuses on time-ravaged parts of the city that maintain a patina of the past through neglect. Slogans and symbols scrawled or sprayed across gable ends, crows looking on, trinkets in a stranger’s porch; all distract from the path ahead. She transforms the world into signs and symbols in the search for pattern and meaning. Intricate meshing of woolen yarn forms a pattern that draws the eye downwards into a stare, a puddle in the footpath interrupts the Moroccan motif and in its reflection spring buds sprout from bare branches.
Kathy Tynan is an artist based in Dublin. Her practice is primarily based in paint. Recent solo and two person exhibitions include Soft Fascination, Kevin Kavanagh, Dublin, 2022, Keep some steady friends around, Dunamaise Art Centre, 2022, Two Painters, Highlanes Gallery, Drogheda, 2020, Luminous Twitch, The Lab, Dublin, 2019, Green Like Now, Kevin Kavanagh, Dublin 2019. Recent group exhibitions include Övergång,Galleri Magnus Karlsson & Kevin Kavanagh, 2022, Golden Fleece Award 21 Years, 2022, Solstice Arts Centre, Dubliners,6th Biennial of Painting, Zagreb, 2021, Home, The Glucksman, Cork, 2020, Zurich Portrait Prize, National Gallery of Ireland & Crawford Gallery, Cork, 2019, Hennessey-Craig Prize, RHA, Dublin 2019.
Tynan’s work was featured in Landscape and Environment in Contemporary Irish Art by Dr. Yvonne, published in 2023. She won The Golden Fleece, special award in 2020 and was shortlisted for The Zurich Portrait Prize and the Hennessey-Craig Prize for Painting in 2019. In 2018 she carried out a three month residency at the Cité International des Arts, Paris. Her work is held in such collections as Trinity College Dublin and the Arts Council of Ireland. Tynan is a lecturer in Technical University Dublin and is represented by Kevin Kavanagh, Dublin.