2020 AC+D Creative Entrepreneurial Fellow: Molly Ryan!

AC+D's Entrepreneurial Fellow this year is Molly Ryan (AC+D '19)!!!

Each year one AC+D Alumni is invited to complete a project, start a new endeavor, or further their professional practice while surrounded by the energy and resources provided by the MFA AC+D Program. The Entrepreneurial Fellow receives a stipend, access to communal shop spaces, and mentorship through our Creative Entrepreneurial Faculty. The Entrepreneurial Fellows, in turn, contribute to the studio culture of the Applied Craft + Design Program by modeling an active, inquisitive and self sustaining creative practice.

Molly graduated from Applied Craft + Design joint degree program from Oregon College of Arts and Crafts and Pacific Northwest College of Art this past May. While in school, her work was primarily conceptual, dealing with the durational effects of grief and the rituals of mourning. Her process is always steeped in the manipulation and reuse of material. She finds the stains left on a drop cloth as interesting as the completed artwork. Of her work Molly says “I am fascinated by the by-product of working with materials. The unintended results that some see as refuse, I see as fuel. I am interested in elevating modest materials and finding beauty in the unexpected results of making."

Molly is in the process of launching a line of fabric goods inspired by her studio drop cloths. "When I discovered that my studio drop cloth had become a work of art in its own right, I upgraded its status from drop cloth to art canvas and used it to make my first pillows and bags.”

Molly works out of her shared Portland based studio where she has joined forces with fellow AC+D alumni Lilia Hernandez Galusha and Brittany Rudolf to create the artist collective Material Loop.