'Ensouled' by Andrew Ramiro Tirado

About the Exhibit:

"As I stand in front of the work in the studio, I watch as liquid hues run in gleaming rivulets down the surface before me. I add layer upon layer of paint, cognizant that most of it will never be seen, buried somewhere below the final, fixed, visible surface. It makes me ponder relevance. If no one can see the buried layers, are they superfluous?

Or is it possible that each layer can convey intention? Can the work become ensouled; endowed with something arousing emotion or sentiment, perhaps even a spiritual or moral force? Can a work of art, so saturated, so “magnetized”, likewise transmit that ensoulment to the viewer?

Can the work, over time, renew a person like the rain does when it saturates the parched ground?" -Andrew Ramiro Tirado

About the Artist:

Born in Washington D.C., Andrew grew up in and currently lives in Colorado. From 1989 until 1991, he was a studio assistant for the painter Chuck Close in New York, helping the artist to transition back into the studio after a major medical event. Moving back to Colorado, he spent many years doing a variety of work from building wood strip canoes, fabricating custom props, displays, sets, and signage, to building custom cabinetry.For over twenty years, he worked as Seminar Faculty for the Marie Walsh Sharpe Art Foundation’s Summer Seminar Program. He has taught at the Bemis School of Art, the Anderson Ranch Arts Center, and, for ten years, taught woodworking and supervised the 3D Arts Facility at the Colorado College.

Since transitioning to art in 2012, he has exhibited in a number of group and solo shows, including a solo exhibit, Open, at the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, in 2014. That same year, his sculptural piece, Lacuna, received both the Jurors’ Choice award and the Peoples’ Choice award for the 16th annual Art on the Streets Exhibit in Colorado Springs, Colorado. In 2016, Andrew established a full-time artistic practice. That year, besides focusing on sculptural work, he traveled to Italy to volunteer his assistance on an exhibit for the Venice Biennale of Architecture exhibition.In 2020, Andrew’s 1000 sf. art studio, in downtown Colorado Springs, was completed, and in 2021, so was his largest project to date; a public art project for the Cox Business Convention Center and the city of Tulsa, Oklahoma.

In 2022, Andrew was Artist-In-Residence for ARTworks 2022 at the Holland Hall School in Tulsa, and had a solo exhibit, [hands]full, at the school’s Holliman Gallery. Andrew continues to work on commissioned and non-commissioned 2D and 3D work and to exhibit his work, with a solo exhibit scheduled for November, 2024, at the Surface Gallery in Colorado Springs.