MICHAEL WANN: The Old Grieving Fields

Solomon is delighted to host a solo exhibition of new work by artist Michael Wann. In this new collection of his distinctive charcoal compositions Wann presents scenes in which terrain and skies are imbued with a sense of foreboding and vulnerability. The Old Grieving Fields is a lament to a landscape in distress.

Through an emotive resonance of light and shade, the mostly unpopulated rural settings in Wann’s compositions are charged with unease and a disquiet of perspective. Smoke rises from distant fields; helicopters hover and night skies are lit by mysterious activity. Wann’s landscapes and patchwork aerial views, heavy with weather, speak of memory and place, of surveillance and the mapping of terrain. 

Currently based in Sligo, Michael Wann was born in Dublin in 1969. He studied at Sligo IT, graduating with a Diploma in Fine Art in 1992 followed by a Bachelor in Fine Art in 2003. He has exhibited widely in Ireland, including solo exhibitions at the RHA, The Model, Sligo, Custom House, Westport, Solstice, Navan, Draiocht, Dublin and with the  Claremorris Gallery, Co. Mayo.  A regular exhibitor at the RHA's Annual Exhibition, he was awarded the AXA Insurance Drawing Prize in 2006, the ESB Sean Keating Prize and the RHA Silver Medal in 2016.  In 2010 he was selected for the Tom Caldwell Drawing Prize and the Inaugural Rowel Friers Perpetual Trophy at the Royal Ulster Academy's Annual Exhibition, and in 2012 awarded a Merit Prize from the Trustees of The Golden Fleece.  In 2023 he was the recipient of a major Visual Arts Bursary Award from the Arts Council of Ireland. His work was acquired by the National Gallery of Ireland in 2023 and subsequently exhibited in their In Real Life exhibition curated by Anne Hodge. In 2024 Wann’s evocative portrait of the late Camille Souter was shortlisted for the AIB Portrait Award at the National Gallery of Ireland and he has recently been shortlisted for the inaugural Sir William Orpen Prize for self portraiture (2025).

Wann’s work is included in public collections such as the National Gallery of Ireland, the Boyle Civic Collection, Waterford Municipal Collection, Office of Public Works, Mayo County Council, Fingal County Council, Beaumont Hospital, Dublin, AXA Insurance and the Ballinglen Archive, as well as private collections in Ireland, UK, France, Germany, Australia, New Zealand and the United States.