Sandra Cavanagh’s career began in 1997, after completing a Foundation in Fine Arts and a BA degree from the Kent Institute of Art and Design, University of Kent, UK. In the time since she has maintained a consistent practice and developed a large portfolio of work to include paintings, drawings and prints. She sustains a mostly narrative focus, often as a reaction to sociopolitical events with the intention of codifying ideas and feelings. Within this development, various subjects recur, such as the mythological feminine as a vehicle to explore patriarchal brutality and its weight on the collective, the consideration of mortality and the loss of innocence in transgenerational stories, visceral reactions both to memories and events of current general concern. She has often worked in series, creating pictorial storylines with some urgency to exhaust the subject and form to the point of understanding or unburdening herself of it. The result is an annotation of feelings underscoring a dramatic approach to form and message.
Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Cavanagh’s first two decades were pitched on the tensions between a loving family life and constant political upheavals, unrestrained military governments and the ominous danger of politically sanctioned brutality and censorship. She read Social Sciences at the University of Belgrano, Buenos Aires before emigrating to California and later to the UK where she completed studies in Fine Art. She returned to full residency in the United States in 2010 and has worked and resided in New York City ever since.
Education
1997
Kent Institute of Art and Design (K.I.A.D.)
B.A. Illustration
1994
Kent Institute of Art and Design (K.I.A.D.)
Foundation Course in Fine Arts
Group Exhibitions
Exhibitions
2024
By Land or By Sea, Pretty Girls Making Cool Shit, Virtual Show
The Now: Fever Dream, Pen & Brush, New York, NY
Static Motion, Gallery 14C, Jersey City, NJ
War, Hudson Valley Museum of Contemporary Art, Peekskill, NY
Every Woman Biennale: I Will Always Love You, La Mama Galleria, New York, NY
Visual Memoirs: Portraits, Self-Portraits, and Selfies, Super Secret Projects, Beacon, NY
Love-Struck, Ely Center of Contemporary Art, Virtual Show
Imaginarium: The Universe of the Mind, NY Artist Circle at Art At First, New York, NY
Myths and Legends of the World, Miami National Fine Arts x EFA Robert Blackburn, Miami, FL
The Incorrigible Drawing clüb.2, Ladies Drawing Club, Virtual Show
Women Celebrate Women 2024, El Barrio's Artspace, New York, NY
2023
Eclecticism, Orange Art Foundation, Virtual Show
The Big Small Show, Drawing Rooms, Jersey City, NJ
The Pain of Others, The Starving Artist, Virtual Show
I Would Prefer Not To, Art Fair 14C at Art150, Jersey City, NJ
Vivarium, Pretty Girls Making Cool Shit, Virtual Show
De.Code, NY Artists Circle, Virtual Show
Family: Blood/Bond, Culture Lab LIC, Plaxall Gallery, Queens, NY
Inevitability of Absence, Culture Lab LIC, Plaxall Gallery, Queens, NY
Childhood Unmuted, Cultural Alliance of Western Connecticut, Virtual Show
The Body Remembers, The Starving Artist, Virtual Show
Abacus, Fresh Salad, Virtual Show
Volume Up: Artists Responding to Music and Sound, The Painting Center, New York, NY
Reflections’ Edition II, Royal Blue Gallery, Virtual Show
Women Celebrate Women, El Barrio Artspace, New York, NY
A Larger Idea, LICA’s Third Annual Drawing Exhibition, LIC-A Art Space at The Factory, Long Island City, NY
City Life: Captured, Scene and Unseen, NY Artists Circle, Virtual Show
2022
13th Annual Figurative Exhibition, Lore Degenstein Gallery, Susquehanna University, Selinsgrove, PA
Lines, Flatfile Gallery, Virtual show
My Body, My Choice, A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Portals, Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition, Brooklyn, NY
2021
Drawn From Life III, Upstream Gallery, Hudson, NY
Artist Talks/Lectures
2023
NYC Group Crit January
2021
Female Artists On Color, ATOA - Virtual Open Studio
Publications
2024
Sandra Cavanagh, Finalist: Painting and Drawing, Women United Art Magazine: Special Edition, April 13, 2024
In the Spotlight: Sandra Cavanagh, Women United Art Prize, Issue 4, February 2024
2023
No Name Collective Magazine, 2023 Volume 5, December 2023
The Pain of Others: Artists Responding to the Impacts of War and Violence, The Starving Artist, November 2023
The Purposeful Mayo Journal, Issue 3.3, November 2023
Studio Visit Book Vol-2, Arts to Hearts Project, 2023
Mosca, David, Artists hope simultaneous fairs elevate 34th JCAST, The Jersey Journal, October 13, 2023
Women's Edition 2023 (Featured on cover), Create! Magazine, Print Issue 37, 2023
Summer '23, Milk Press, The Poetry Society of New York, 2023
Blue, Polemical Zine, Issue 19, Fall 2023
Suboart Magazine, Print Issue #7, July 2023
Sandra Cavanagh, Epicenter NYC, 30 May, 2023
Feminist Spaces Journal, Department of English at the University of West Florida, Fall/Winter Issue, 2023
Divide Magazine, Issue 5, February 2023
Rituals & Ceremonies, Sunflower Station Press, Print Issue 3, January 2023
Artist Interview: Sandra Cavanagh, Contemporary Art Collectors Catalogue, January 2023
Awards
2023
Finalist (4th Place) - 2023 Women United Art Prize: Painting & Drawing Category, Juried by Gita Joshi, Ekaterina Popova, Erika B Hess and Mona Lerch
Special Mention Artist, Emerging Woman Artist Award
Affiliations
Al-Tiba9
Contemporary Art Collectors Emerging Artists Program 2023
Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition
Guild Hall
NY Artists Circle
Odetta Digital
Paradise Palace