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Moira Hahn
Artist's Statement:
I was born in Boston and earned my BFA degree at The Maryland Institute College of Art, in Baltimore, Maryland. I moved west at 19 to attend California College of Arts and Crafts (now California College of the Arts) in Oakland, California.
In my 20s I studied animation at CalArts, in Valencia, CA and later worked in the animation industry and illustrated books and magazines for The Pushpin Group, an artists' agency in New York. I studied Japanese art in Hawaii and Japan for several years and later taught studio art classes at several colleges and universities in Southern California. I have exhibited my fine art throughout the US and Japan for two decades.
Hedonistic and naturalist impulses guide me. Gardening, hiking, swimming, dancing, birdwatching, astronomy, antiques, animation, coyotes, cultural anthropology and comparative religions interest me and often inform my work. Although I enjoy reading for pleasure, I reserve most of my time for studying and producing art.
In Asian art, I'm inspired by Persian miniatures, Tibetan Thanka paintings, Japanese Ukiyo-e prints, Indian animal drawings and Chinese guardian figures. In Western art, I'm magnetized by the documentary art of Explorer/ Scientist painters including Martin Johnson Heade, John James Audobon and Karl Bodmer. Contemporary artists I admire include Bob Anderson, Hilary Brace, Chuck Close, Henry Darger, Daniel Du Plessis, Don Ed Hardy, Tim Hawkinson, Jess, William Kentridge, Tom Knechtel, Sarah Perry, Hisashi Tenmyouya and Thomas Woodruff.
My dad was stationed in China as a pilot with the Army Air Corps during World War II. A friend of his was a translator for the US in Japan during the occupation and later served as the US envoy to Kobe/ Osaka. I grew up with Asian art and antiques that they sent back. My dad’s family had also collected antiques. My favorite artifact was a 1920s lamp incorporating an Austrian cold-painted bronze figure of a rug merchant in a well-stocked stall by Franz Bergman. My mom collected netsuke.
My dad’s friend in Japan appreciated folk toys, so as children, my sister and I received papier-mâché tigers, a miniature teahouse (with hearth, tatami, iron kettle, water wheel, a creek, every beautifully proportioned and fabricated detail looms in memory) and other delights based on 19th century or earlier play things. Our Barbie trousseaux included kimono and futons. I still have seven silkworm cocoons intricately painted as the seven lucky gods. Some of these treasures find their way into my art.
Although I learned a great deal about prints from Masami [Teraoka], I’d previously studied ukiyo-e at the Walters Art Gallery (now Walters Museum) in Baltimore MD in the 70s while a student at the Maryland Institute College of Art. The museum held a retrospective of Hokusai drawings, paintings, prints and manga that knocked my socks off. I continued to study ukiyo-e in Honolulu, at the Academy, drawing from the Michener collection.
What may set my Asian-themed work apart from works by other artists is its concentration on animal characters and situations. When I moved to Long Beach (California) a decade ago, our back yard provided daily Kabuki of altercations between neighborhood or feral cats and wildlife, mostly birds. I started painting about it. A flock of escaped green parrots screeches over our house daily. It’s not unusual to see blue heron strut through the local park as we walk our dog. I adore animals and birds, so it’s natural that they appear in my work. Utagawa Kuniyoshi was also a cat owner and enthusiast, provides inspiration, and is credited by name as an influence in some of my paintings.
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