Artist: Ashley Hannan

Shell with hand and rose

18"w x 24"h

"Ashley Hannan is originally from Valdosta, GA and currently lives in Tampa, FL. She is Deaf, having lost her hearing at a young age to medicine, treating an unknown illness. Ashley attended an oral deaf institute in St. Louis to learn how to speak and was mainstreamed in Georgia public schools as the only deaf student among her hearing peers. Hannan earned a bachelor's degree in Graphic Design from Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, NY in 2008 and is currently the Communications Coordinator of Florida Deaf Art Show.

A few years after college, Ashley geared her creativity away from computers towards painting. Her vibrant paintings that range from landscapes to deaf visual art reside in numerous U.S. private art collections and in a few homes internationally. Her latest solo show called "Rise Up: Silent Margins" was held in Rochester, NY at the Dyer Arts Center at NTID. The show comprised of 19 paintings that visually speaks of Hannan's journey as an oral Deaf person seeking for her identity between the hearing and deaf worlds and how ASL has helped her fill in the gaps of verbal communication and identity."