Kate Rivers

Gallery Affiliations: Matthews Gallery, Joseph Gierek Fine Art

Region: West

Website: http://www.kateriversart.com

City / State: Santa Fe, NM

My work is abstract, focused on color and texture. All the work is structurally dense, complex, and layered—a metaphor for the complexity of obsession. Collage is the fundamental medium. Frequently, the collage is combined with oil stick, paint, and machine- and hand-stitching. Scale is extremely important. While many pieces are small, my goal is to construct mural-size works created from either books or merchandise tags. The quantity of the materials used in the production of a piece is a statement of the entanglement of collecting and obsession.

I am passionate about my collage media, choosing materials that are obsolete yet precious, or that represent something that can seem valuable at one moment and become insignificant later: books, for example, are collected, rarely read, and usually end up discarded. I find them at estate sales and Goodwill. Clothing tags are especially seductive, because they are well designed and engage the need to buy.