Artist’s Reception for Erin Garrity-Duffey

An artist’s reception will be held on Saturday, April 1st, from 6-8PM at Madron Gallery.

Madron Gallery presents Working Memory, an exhibition of new work and the first solo gallery show for Erin Garrity-Duffey. Opening March 6 and running through June 16, 2023, Working Memory investigates the nexus of art, science, and the human condition. 

Erin Garrity-Duffey’s art is consumed with the mechanics, formation, and deterioration of the human brain. Neuroscientific studies of memory loss, early childhood development, and trauma have produced a wave of discoveries in recent decades about how the mind functions and falls apart. This research — collected from science journals, newspapers, and magazines — has acted as inspiration and source material for Garrity-Duffey. Her drawings and paintings are reminiscent of magnified fluid pressed between glass slides, reflecting a longstanding practice of observing blood, scabs, and all manner of biological specimens under the microscope; biomorphic forms allude to the interior of the human body without directly portraying it. Working Memory consists of 16 paintings and 18 drawings by Garrity-Duffey.   

Erin Garrity-Duffey is an artist and educator. She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2004 and a Master of [Education in Reading?] from Xavier University in 2011. Garrity-Duffey’s artwork has been exhibited at The Other Art Fair in Chicago and Dallas, Bridgeport Art Center in Chicago, and Illinois Art Education Association Exhibition, as well as at local Chicago businesses and online at Saatchi Art. Garity-Duffey’s work can be found in private collections in Illinois, Florida, Ohio, New Jersey, and Texas.

Madron Gallery showcases the breadth and depth of nineteenth and twentieth-century art in the United States with its diverse inventory of paintings, drawings, sculptures, photographs, and prints by less widely-recognized artists. While the gallery’s American Impressionist pieces initially put it on the map, Madron also features an outstanding and constantly evolving collection of modern and contemporary art, aiming to illuminate artistic connections across decades and centuries.

Madron Press, formally established in 2020, seeks to further scholarship around significant but oft-overlooked American artists. Robert Vonnoh: American Impressionist and William S. Schwartz: Color and Coloratura are both available for purchase online.

Image: Reconstructed, acrylic and oil on canvas, 48 x 60 inches, 2022