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I work with a simple elemental form, a curve made from the most basic natural material, clay. I make and build with hundreds or thousands of these forms. The clay curve connects me to time, the earth, the elements and human culture. The geometry of a curve weaves and allows construction. The clay curves I roll are each similar but unique connecting them to the natural world where blades of grass are almost the same but never quite the same. The process I use to construct the sculptures follows the patterns in nature. The shapes grow in the space allotted them through adding curve after curve. The forms are always transitory, in a space for a given amount of time. The sculptures cannot be moved without taking them apart and reconstructing them. They are built curve-by-curve and disassembled one by one. This process of continual and possible change and transformation connects me to the natural world along with the ordered chaos that comes from organizing thousands upon thousands of individual elements into a form. I garden. I love color and light and the changes light and shadows create. With the sculptures I compose with bright color and form in a space. With its deliberately ‘un-natural’ color, the work celebrates aspects of nature but does not attempt to mimic it.
The constructions are abstract...rings, lines, cones, circles but often evoke real things: sea anemones, coral reefs, haystacks or wind blown grasses.
BEAN FINNERAN
Education
Goucher College
University of Michigan
Museum School, Boston Museum of Fine Arts, MA
Massachusetts College of Art
Solo Exhibitions
2008
XXe Biennale Internationale de Ceramique Contemporaine de Vallauris, France
2007
REALMS, The Philadelphia Art Alliance, Philadelphia, PA
New Work, Perimeter Gallery, Chicago, IL
CYCLE, Baltimore Clayworks, Baltimore, MD
Meander, University of Oklahoma, Stillwater, OK
2006
Shift, PDX Contemporary Art, Portland, OR
Installations, Nancy Margolis Gallery, New York, NY
Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA
Gail Severn Gallery, Sun Valley, ID
Philadelphia Art Alliance, Philadelphia, PA
University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK (installation)
2005
Slow Time / Play Time, The Mills College Art Museum, Oakland, CA
2003
Arcs in Time, Montalvo Gallery, Saratoga, CA
PDX Contemporary Art, Portland, OR
San Jose Museum of Art (20,000 piece installation)
Yellow, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA
2002
Bean Finneran: Recurrence, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO
2000
Eyre/Moore Gallery
New Work Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA
1999
The 2nd Annual International Art Exposition, San Francisco, CA
Davis Art Center, Davis, CA
1997
Introduction, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA
Group Exhibitions
2008
Holter Museum of Art, Helena, MT
2006
Mendhall Sobieski Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
“Multiplicity: Contemporary Ceramic Sculpture,” Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center for the Visual Arts, University of Texas, El Paso, TX (traveling)
“Arts Botanica,” Loyola University Museum of Art, Chicago, IL
2005
“Tales from the Kiln,” San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA
“NEXT,” PDX Contemporary Art, Portland, OR
“Jerry Bennett and Bean Finneran: Pushing the Limits,” John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, WI
3rd World Ceramics Bienniale, World Ceramic Exposition Foundation, Icheon City, Korea
“From Tiles to Totems: A Century of Northern California Ceramics,” Art Foundry, Sacramento, CA
2004
“Subtraction & Addition: Ceramic Sculpture and Installations,” Museum of Craft and Folk Art, San Francisco, CA
“Critical Mass,” Texas State University, San Marcos, TX
“Black & White,” Linda Ross Contemporary, Detroit, MI
Pucini Lubel Gallery, Seattle, WA
Susan Street Fine Arts Gallery, Solano Beach, CA
“Chaos/Control,” Perimeter Gallery, Chicago, IL
Gail Severn Gallery, Ketchum, ID
PDX Contemporary Art, Portland, OR
“A Rare Glimpse: Modern American Art from Private Napa Valley Collections,” Napa Valley Museum, Napa, CA
2003
“Branch Out,” Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA
San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, San Jose, CA
“Small Works,” Kemper Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO
2002
“Conceptual Color,” Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History, CA
Scripps 58th Ceramic Annual, Scripps College, Claremont, CA
2001
Conceptual Color, San Francisco State University Gallery, San Francisco, CA
PDX Gallery, Portland, OR
1999
“New Space, New Work,” Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA
1998
Landscape as Memory, Haines Gallery, San Francisco, CA
SOFA, Chicago, IL
Ceramics Annual, John Natsoulis Gallery, Davis, CA
1997
ARTSHOW 1, Microsoft Art Collection, Seattle, WA
Public Collections
Microsoft Inc.
Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO
Mills College Art Museum, Oakland, CA
San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA
John Michael Kohler Arts Center
Bibliography
2006
Libby, Brian. “Fueled by Organic Inspirations.” A&E, The Oregonian, March 17, 2006.
“Shift, Bean Finneran,” Port, March 1, 2006
2005
Ming, Bai. World Famous Ceramic Artist’s Studios 1: Volume of America (1). Hebei, Chine: Hebei Fine Arts Publishing House, 2005.
Cohn, Terry. “Bean Finneran at Mills College Art Museum.” Artweek April, 2005: 17.
Schumachet, Mary Louise. “Cast in Clay: Artists Use Traditional Medium to Craft Engaging Tales.” The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 2005.
2004
Porges, Maria, Bean Finneran’s Performative Art, Ceramics: Art and Perception International, September 2004
Berry, Colin. “‘Subtraction and Addition’ at the Museum of Craft & Folk Art.” Artweek July/August 2004: 17.
Porges, Maria. “Bean Finneran’s Performative Art.” Ceramics: Art and Perception Issue 57, 2004: 12-14.
Rossbund, Krissa. “Bayside Beauty: A Showhouse Living Room Celebrates its “Golden” Neighbor.” Traditional Home May, 2004: 56-59.
2003
Major, Mandy. “Finneran’s Colorful Collection on Display.” Saratoga Style September 17, 2003: 25-27.
2002
Cash, Stephanie. “Report From San Francisco: Surviving and Thriving.” Art in America November, 2002: 59-75.
Fleming, Bronwen. “Scripps 58th Ceramic Annual Puts the Artist Back in Art.” Claremont Collage February 5, 2002.
Anderson, Isabel, Ceramic Annual 2002 at Scripps College, Artweek, May 2002
Porges, Maria F., “Bean Finneran; Between Art and Nature,” January 2002
Levin, Elaine, Scripps College 58th Ceramic Annual, Ceramics Monthly, April 2002
Allen, Stuart, Exhibition Built Just for Davis Art Center, The Enterprise, March 2002
Selvin, Nancy, Fundamentally Clay: Ceramic Abstraction 2002,Ceramics: Art and Perception No. 47, 2002
Mendenhall, Lauri, Seductive Discovery, Coast, March 2002
Kanff, Devorah L., Inland Ceramic Show Melds Whimsy, Skill, The Enterprise, February 2002
Fleming, Bronwen, Scripps 58th Ceramic Annual Puts the Artist Back in Art, Claremont Collage, February 2002
Thorson, Alice, Clay with Something to Say, The Kansas City Star, January, 2002
2001
Schwartz, Judith S., Bean Finneran, American Ceramic, April 2001
Julian, Kimi, “Ceremicists of the World, Unite,” CCACA