KATY MORAN
Katy Moran is a British painter known for her compelling abstractions that explore form, colour and surface, enlisting a spectrum of mark-making in the expression of different atmospheres. While some of her paintings suggest traditional land or seascapes and conjure figurative associations, they are essentially records of the intangible and are deliberately engaged in sensation, as opposed to representation. Much of Moran’s inspiration comes from her transcendental meditation practice and ideas for paintings are incubated during these sessions. This connection with her unconscious allows for an intuitive approach that prioritises the autonomy of paint as a medium. Moran’s painting is process driven, following the nature of acrylic paint in experimental methods such as drips, pours and body painting. By allowing the nature of paint to inform the painting process, Moran is antithetically liberated from the bonds of materiality.
Moran’s paintings are by nature dichotomous, bringing together opposing forces in a single composition: fullness and space, simplicity and complexity, control and abandon. Moran has often worked with found, framed paintings used as the starting point of her compositions. Her layered approach relates to that of a palimpsest, reworking the existing forms with a thorough investigation of the limits of paint. Where the readymade has previously played a central role in her work, the artist has recently set aside the found, framed paintings she used as supports in favour of larger canvases that allow her to work at scale. A sense of artistic freedom characterises these new paintings, which unite the raw, fresh energy of splattered paint with thickets of dense mark making, and translucent washes of colour.
Katy Moran (b. 1975, Manchester) lives and works in Hertfordshire. She completed an MA Fine Art in painting at the Royal College of Art, London in 2005. In 2025 presented her first solo exhibition with Pippy Houldsworth Gallery, London. Moran’s work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Parasol Unit for Contemporary Art, London (2015); Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin (2013); Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH (2010); Tate St. Ives (2009); and Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (2008). Her work has been featured in group exhibitions at Tate St. Ives (2018); Aspen Art Museum, CO (2015); Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN (2013); SFMOMA, CA (2012); and Tate Britain, London (2008). Her work is housed in important public and private collections including Arts Council Collection, London; David Roberts Art Foundation; Government Art Collection, London; The Rachofsky Collection, Dallas; Royal College of Art, London; Tate, London; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, CA; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN; Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT; and Zabludowicz Collection, London. Moran is also represented by Sperone Westwater Gallery, New York.
Text courtesy Pippy Houldsworth Gallery.
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