Paul Harryn 
Residency:
April 1 – 17, 2018

Paul Harryn is an artist (painter), musician, and author based in Easton, Pennsylvania. His new paintings are a joyful expression of energy and life – an art that reflects vitality while embracing the challenges of the 21st Century. Depicted as integrated layers of modern-world references against a backdrop of circumstance and environment, the paintings are conjured through a full-range of influences – responsive to past and present, good and bad, design and improvisation – all in a vivid, simultaneous display of interactive themes that investigate tensions between natural rhythms and human rationale. Harryn’s past residencies at the 18th Street Arts Center have provided gateways to enduring inspirations that inform his work of perspective and possibility. It is part of a cultural heritage that nourishes creative consciousness.

Harryn’s career began more than three decades ago after seven years of intensive academic, mentorship, and apprenticeship training while studying art. After years of being an active participant in the New York art scene, Harryn was introduced to west coast sensibilities beginning in the early 1980s. This provided a much broader perspective of America’s art and cultural zeitgeist. Subsequent projects in Europe and the Middle East continue to illuminate his role as an artist of this century. All of Harryn’s work – paintings, drawings, music, performance, installation, and video – are extrapolated from the notion that expressionism requires syntax to convey the ambiguities of modern experience while providing alternative reference points. Degree programs at Kutztown University, New Arts, and the University of the Arts (Phila.) had a major influence on early development.

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