About KellyAnne Hanrahan

Born: Chicago, 1972.

I began thinking seriously about art at the age of 14 when I fortuitously got the chance to take painting lessons from Marie Burton, a student of Ivan Albright. She taught me the fundamentals of oil painting - technique, mediums, color mixing - and focused on having me recreate master pieces and paint landscapes and portraits. By the time I was 16, I wanted to break with tradition and begin experimenting. I applied to the Early College Program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and was accepted. When it was time to choose an art school, SAIC was my choice.

While a student at SAIC, I began in the painting department doing a series of circus freaks on unstretched canvas with black ink and watered down acrylics. Using this series got me accepted into a foreign exchange program and I spent 1992 in Manchester, England exploring circus freakery on canvas at Manchester Metropolitan University.

After a year back in Chicago, I got interested in doing comic books and started my own series. Using this series, I again applied and got accepted to a foreign exchange program which allowed me to spend 1994 in Nottingham, England drawing comics.

I graduated from SAIC with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting in 1994, and set up an illustration business (koolass.com). In 1999 I moved my studio to New York City. I have exhibited my paintings in New York City, Chicago, and Kyoto Japan.