Kathryn O’Halloran
In The Inner-Garden, Everything is Permissible
March 19 - April 23, 2022

The gallery is transformed into a young girl’s bedroom (lair). An old satellite dish antenna is the bed upon which she dreams - sending and receiving signals from psyche to self, sharpening her instincts. A garden arch (portal) is a symbolic gateway to serenity through which she passes from outer world to inner world, where no desire is taboo. In the safety of her lair, life-force builds upon itself - like a forest in a sealed bottle. When she preens in the mirror (garden gazing globe), she is reminded of her own power simply by seeing herself reflected. Ceramic vessels throughout the space contain her secrets, her grief, and her joy.

Wall works with embedded road reflectors conjure animal eyes at night. All sets of eyes are in threes rather than pairs - this is the lair of a pit viper. Pit vipers have a heat-sensing organ between their eyes for the purpose of detecting prey. In many spiritual practices the third eye perceives beyond sight - it intuits. Through cultivating the inner world, where everything is permissible, the child strengthens her third eye. And like the pit viper, she can know what she wants and needs - and she can go in for the kill. When she goes out into the world, and loses sight of her own wants and needs, she can come back to her garden, bathe in her own reflection, download from psyche to self, and she knows that if it feels right, it is right.

During Covid I quit my job, moved to the desert, became a mother, and made this show. This exhibition of sculptures is about being in right relationship with one’s instincts - even in the face of societal and familial conditioning that would have a woman abandon herself in service to the patriarchy, to capitalism, and to white supremacy (and on a daily scale, to her job, family, and friends). I went into my lair in March of 2020, where I got in touch with my own aggressive and loving capacities.

Kathryn O’Halloran (b. 1984, Oak Park, IL) creates spaces that aid in self-empowerment and quietude in the face of a bleak socio-economic future for young Americans. She is excited about what seems to be the impending end-of-the-world, in hopes that a new, better world can emerge. She often guilds surfaces with conductive metals used in emergency situations. The mirror-like quality attracts attention, holds heat, and reflects light. By returning the viewer’s own warmth back to herself, O’Halloran explores the notion of self saving self. Her installation works are places to ruminate on the dichotomies of exposure and secrecy, fullness and emptiness, hunkering down and calling out.

O’Halloran received her MFA in 2013 from Cranbrook Academy and a BA from Hampshire College in 2006. She has presented her work in Chicago and throughout the Los Angeles area including solo exhibitions at Harmony Murphy Gallery and Bozo Mag. She has taught ceramics at CalArts and the Interlochen Arts Academy in Interlochen, Maine. In 2021, she opened the temporary curatorial project Kathryn & Friends: a conceptual store of artist editions in Yucca Valley, CA. She attended the Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts in Newcastle, Maine in 2012 She currently lives and works in Desert Hot Springs, CA.

www.kathrynohalloran.art