Anna Riley
Anna Riley
Workspace Program Resident 2017
For What Binds
At Dieu Donné I began with an idea in mind: to experiment in a variety of methods to create ‘sheets of lime’. Lime is a calcium rich material which can be made from a range of natural resources—sea shells, limestone—and is traditionally used in construction materials (mortar, plaster, glass, etc.). My research into lime manufacture stems from my work in glass and my familiarity with soda glass recipies. As I became familiar with lime as a pervasive ingredient of our daily lives, my interest persisted. Lime hides unnoticed in the seams between bricks, and is invisible within window panes. What if we encountered lime as a sheet, would we recognize it?Being in the studio forced me to consider the omnipresence of these two seemingly disparate materials: paper and lime. For me, Dieu Donné unfolded the material conditions of paper-making in a way that can only occur as a material witness or practitioner. Introducing nontraditional materials (stone) into the paper making process (and pulp fibers) creates an added challenge and openness for experimentation. What ratio of lime to fiber compose a thin membrane or a thicker, object-like sheet? How do the different fibers react to lime?
I became interested in the form of the “sheet” as it both relates to and opposes the vocabulary of construction and industry.
As a unit it can be repeated like bricks, blocks, and panes. However a sheet desires thinness and, unlike a cinderblock, its structural integrity is self-serving. These “sheets of lime” would not be empty pages awaiting an image, but material content within the internal structure of the paper. It turns out the fibers can nearly disappear while holding the lime in a way that allows it to appear as something akin to a cement veneer. Working with Studio Collaborator Tatiana Ginsberg was really special—the project was dependent upon her expertise, opens to experimentation, and sensitivity to material and gesture. Through her
insights into how different fibers perform, I felt compelled to honor the fiber as an equal performer in the work. My residency work shares my material exploration, and resulted in a series of works where an image is created from the lime mixture and fused to a layer of fibers.—Anna Riley, 2017
Anna Riley’s residency took the form of a material exploration. As a visual artist driven by material research her work often changes or re-creates the way in which a material is made, challenging the viewer to see it in new ways. Through this work she seeks to inspire conversations about transformation, industry and labor. Riley’s investigations in the medium of glass drove her to research lime manufacturing, and compelled by its materiality she was inspired to use lime in the creation of her works in paper.
In the Studio
About the Artist
Anna Riley (b. 1992) received her BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2014. Riley’s work and research, often tactile and dependent on experimentation, has been awarded with residencies at Residency Unlimited (2019), Urban Glass (2018), University of Texas-Arlington Emerging Artist in Residence (2018), the Museum of Arts and Design (2017), Dieu Donné Papermill (2017), the Studio at the Corning Museum of Glass (2017), the Creative Glass Center of America Fellowship at WheatonArts (2016), the Thicket (2016), and Wave Pool Gallery (2016). She has had a solo exhibition in 2018 at the Museum of Arts and Design (NY) and at Agnes Varis Window Gallery in 2019.
For more information, please visit their website: https://annariley.org/