CONTEMPORARY ART STOCKROOM Janne Kearney

Not one to shy away from confronting subject matter, Janne Kearney’s hyper-real, brilliantly colourful paintings explore issues surrounding gender inequality, the experiences of people abandoned by society, as well as portraying the trauma inflicted by a disjointed youth justice systems. By dissecting societal stereotypes her works strives to highlight the social challenges faced by these marginalised individuals and asks her audience to disregard preconceived ideas about people, cultures and gender.

Read: Janne Kearney featured in Beautiful Bizzare

Reflecting the textures and colours of contemporary street culture, Kearney’s subjects exist within the confines of abandoned urban spaces or are set free within the weightless expanse of an abstract field. Utilising the dramatic possibilities of light and dark her images evoke notions of both love and loneliness, damage and possibility, and the hope that exists inbetween these states. Incorporating the symbolic motif of the rainbow into many of her works, as well utalizing an innovative technique of 3D painting, her images radiate with a progressive optimism that champions a world of inclusivity, tolerance and acceptance.

“I have been concentrating on painting with high contrast light for a few years now. I love the symbolism of light and shade as much as I do the effect resulting from its use; it sends a powerful message that, even in the darkest of moments, if we search for it, we can find the light.”
Janne Kearney, 2018

Kearney has exhibited widely and has an impressive award history. Most recently Kearney has been announced as the winner of the Lethbridge 20000 Art Award (2020), and a finalist in the 2020 Shirley Hannan National Portrait Award, the Portia Geach Art Prize (2020, 2018), the Lester Prize (2020) and the Clayton UTZ Art Award (2019, 2018). In 2018 she was selected as a finalist in the Stanthorpe Art Prize, the Black Swan Portrait Prize and one of seven winners of the American Fashion Week San Diago Annual ARC Salon Awards. She has twice been awarded the Corangamarah Small Scale Art Prize (2017 & 2016) and in 2017 her artwork 86 (Rhyming Slang for Worth Nix) was featured on the cover of the BP Portrait Award exhibition catalogue at London's National Portrait Gallery. That work subsequently entered the collection of renowned UK art collector Mervyn Metcalf. Kearney has also been a finalist in the Clayton UTZ Award (2018, 2017, 2016), the Doug Moran Portrait Prize (2017, 2015) and the Lethbridge Art Prize (2017, 2016, 2015, 2000). She has exhibited works in the London Portrait Gallery, Scottish National Portrait Gallery, The Sunderland Museum England, Royal Albert Museum and Art Gallery Exeter, Arte dall’ Turin Italy, Salmagundi Club New York, Lux Art Institute San Diego, Sotheby’s Los Angeles, and the Museu Europeu d'Art Modern in Barcelona.