Worthian artist exhibits in Florence

Thu, Oct 5th, 2023

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Artist Micheal Haran’s work is gaining recognition and this month he will be exhibiting at the Florence Biennale. We find out more about Micheal and his career in our first ‘Alumni in the News’ feature of this academic year.

Micheal Haran, who was in Rutherford House, studied at the Slade School of Fine Art, UCL after leaving Worth in 1985 and is now a multidisciplinary artist working in all types of materials. The themes of his work are wide-ranging and include abstract expressionism, abstract figurative or biomorphic and playful surrealism, highly coloured and full of motion, using a multitude of mediums.

As Micheal says, “I was never going to live an ordinary life after three years at Worth.”

He spent two-and-a-half years living in Iquitos, Peru, studying Plant Spirit Shamanism, which had a profound effect on his life. His son was born in Amazonia and he is passionate about Amazonian and other rainforest conservation. He has raised monies for Rainforest Trust, The Peru Mission and other ecological charities. In January 2020 Micheal had a solo exhibition of paintings at The Tabernacle gallery in Notting Hill from which he gave 40% of sale proceeds to The Rainforest Trust and other charities.

Micheal now lives and works in West London. His painting ‘Flowers of Serenity’ was featured in Saatchi Art’s Chief Curator’s Summer 2023 Collection and he will be exhibiting eight of his paintings at the Florence Biennale at Fortezza da Basso, Florence, Italy from 14-22 October.

Worth likes to keep in touch and hear what former students are up to in their lives, and we run regular articles featuring alumni.