Opens Sunday, October 19th at Rockford Art Museum

Rockford Art Museum (RAM) opens Echoes of Presence and Place-An Installation of Works by Michael x. Ryan, 1979-2025 on Sunday, October 19th. Join us for a free public opening and gallery walk with exhibiting artist Michael x. Ryan on Sunday, October 19th at 2 PM at Rockford Art Museum. The gallery walk will begin at 2 PM.

Chicago-based artist Michael x. Ryan gathers the quiet imprints we leave behind — from sidewalk stains and river paths to shower puddles and fallen tree limbs — and gives them form, weight, and voice. Through drawing, mapping, wood relief, and 3D printed objects, Ryan captures traces of human presence — the edge of a river, the imprint of a wet body, the marks on a street — and renders them as physical forms that evoke movement, memory, and place.

This exhibition brings together key installations spanning over four decades, from early works shaped by the Ox-Bow landscape to large-scale reliefs inspired by the streets of Chicago to one tree of interest on the family property in Woodstock, Illinois. By drawing attention to overlooked details, Ryan invites us to consider how our everyday movements shape the spaces we inhabit — and how those spaces, in turn, record and reflect our presence and passage through time.

Echoes of Presence and Place is organized by Rockford Art Museum Executive Director/Chief Curator, Carrie Johnson. The exhibition and free admission is sponsored by the Johnson Family Foundation; Anne and David Boccignone, and Janet and Steve Platcow. Related educational programming is partially supported by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council Agency and Women’s Art Board.

It is the mission of Rockford Art Museum to foster creativity and build community through visual arts.