| Statement My practice investigates structures that regulate human behavior. These include those that are self-made and those that are inflicted by external forces. I am interested in how these systems inform our perception of time, and shape lived experience. I am interested in how we as indiviuals frame what constitutes a lived life. How do we choose what activities (labor/leisure) we repeat, and what we isolate as a moment in time? How does repetition and variation shape our identity and autonomy? My work builds and takes from systems that are human made, those in which error and subjectivity are immersed into the layers of logic. I draw inspiration from maps, floorplans, task lists, diary entries, weather predictions, and other miscellaneous repetitive behavioral regulators. These sources act as scores for live and recorded compositions where figures move through environments, which are often re-imagined through electronic space. With video at the center of my practice, my work takes the form of single channel videos, installations, drawings, and performances. These ideas inform not only my approach to art, but to how I exist living in a high-density city where space and time are the ultimate commodity. My work offers temporary respite from the systems of regulation I subscribe to and engage with in everyday life. — Blithe Riley, 2010 Biography Blithe Riley works in video, performance & installation. Her practice investigates systems that regulate human behavior, including self-induced structures as well as those inflicted from external sources. Riley received a BFA from Alfred School of Art and Design in 1999, and an MFA from Carnegie Mellon University in 2005 where she taught courses in video and performance. In 2009 she was a resident of Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. Her work has screened nationally & internationally at venues such as the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, The Kitchen, Roulette, Broadway 1602 Gallery and Monkeytown in New York City, The Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh and The European Media Arts Festival in Germany. She has taught classes at Columbia College Chicago, Parsons, and George Washington University. She lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. Riley also makes site-specific video and performance work with artist Mary Coble. Together they have made work in an abandoned spring house in Maine, and in a soon-to-be demolished housing project in Northeast London. Their next project is planned for summer 2010, on the beach surrounding a former landfill in Brooklyn, NY called Dead Horse Bay. |