Rachel Rinker
painting, drawing, printmaking, collage
Visual problem solving is how I process my states of being as they change over time. I use painting, drawing, printmaking, and collage to form nonlinear personal narratives and abstract landscapes with an unsettled sense of time and place. Nothing starts as a blank canvas, and layers matter a great deal to me – in terms of material and material history. I often work with upcycled materials to accentuate the layers of human connection necessary for my works to come to life.
With a process heavy practice rooted in nostalgia, personal archive, and the need for organizational structures to manage entropy, I hope viewers find something connective and human in the layered, visually stimulating environments and abstract landscapes funneled through my sensibilities as a Southern, queer, non-binary artist.
Having grown up in South Carolina, I have my BFA in Visual Arts with an emphasis in Painting from Clemson University. My experiences have taken me up and down the east coast several times to connect with both northern and southern roots, and I take inspiration from my travels across the continental 48 States as well.