BIOGRAPHY

Ledy is best recognized for her works on paper. They can be found in the permanent collections at the Arkansas Art Center, Baltimore Museum of Art, Blanton Museum of Art, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Colorado Springs Fine Art Center, Fogg Art Museum, Hood Museum of Art, Krannert Art Museum, Minneapolis Institute of Art, Museum of Modern Art, the National Gallery of Art, Rhode Island College of Art Museum, San Diego Museum of Art, University of Minnesota, Walker Art Center, Weatherspoon Art Museum, and Yale University Art Museum.

“In 1990, Ann Ledy began a new body of works on paper, a development linked to her book pieces of the 1980’s, which explored the physical experience of viewing and reading in relation to memory. Ledy was fascinated by the idea of the book as an object-in-succession. She has compared the effects of visual memory in this context to ‘afterimages’ that ‘mark time’. The works in this [A New York Drawing Collection at Work] exhibition represent the next step in the evolution of Ledy’s practice, when she began to assemble pages in unbound groupings, utilizing two geometric forms – the circle and the square – as the basis of her compositional matrix. Marks added to this matrix came from personal resources, such as the artist’s experience of time as evidenced in the shapes and trajectories of shadows…”

(560 Broadway A New York Drawing Collection at Work, 1991-2006. Chapter: “Exhibitions at the Fifth Floor Foundation”, Amy Eshoo, Editor, P. 36.)

 This excerpt was taken from an exhibition catalog showcasing the collected works of Werner Kramarsky.  Kramarsky is recognized for his significant collection of works on paper and their place in the hierarchy of the art world. His collection championed minimalist and post-minimalist artists.

Ledy continues to consider works on paper her primary medium. The elemental geometry of the circle and the square are the rudimentary component of Ledy’s visual vocabulary. Light and shadow are key considerations in her interpretive wall reliefs and other two-dimensional works in mixed media.

Prior to moving from the mid-west onto New York for graduate school, Ledy had worked in her family owned industrial fabrication business. At that time, the company was primarily engaged in die cutting plastic computer components, engraving, and screen printing. This experience introduced Ledy to a wide range of diverse materials and processes.

Years later, Ledy was heavily influenced by her travels via her academic career. Her experience evolved from teaching drawing to writing curriculum that would be instituted at affiliate college campuses around the world. This experience introduced her to five disparate countries. Most different from western tradition and influence, was her time in Asia in particular, South Korea, Southern Japan, and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Her observations forever altered her approach to mark making and basic tenets of communication.

Today, Ledy finds inspiration in the world she has traveled and documented. She has a particular passion for modernist architecture and urban design. Ledy maintained a studio in New York City for four decades. Today, she lives and works in Millbrook, New York.

Academic posts include: Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, New York, Parsons School of Design, New York, New York, and the College of Visual Arts, Saint Paul, Minnesota.

Ledy received her MFA in painting from Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, New York; and her BFA in painting from the University of Minnesota, in Minneapolis.