Drunk Girl, 2010, 36" x 27"
For several years, Erin M. Riley has been making people feel uncomfortable in the fine art world using the unlikely medium of hand-dyed wool. Her hand-woven tapestries have made us confront isolation and addiction and think about our family histories. Erin demonstrates how the the callous, unforgiving internet is woven into many of our sensitive social interactions. In fact, she finds the imagery for her tapestries of young people using Google image search and Facebook.
Erin is currently a
McColl Center for Visual Art artist-in-residence. She has exhibited throughout the country and her shows have been featured in Juxtapose Magazine and on FecalFace.com. She earned a BFA in Fibers from Massachusetts College of Art and Design and a MFA in Fibers at Tyler School of Art. She lives in Philadelphia, PA but is a bit nomadic, traveling to residencies and living in different cities for months at a time, all in the name of her art. Considering the subject matter of her work, it was ironic that we had the conversation below using Facebook Chat.
Sarah Terry: Is this a good time to do the interview?Erin Riley: Yes it is. I’m just in my studio.
ST: Do you have set studio hours for the residency?ER: Yea, I have to be in the studio 11-4 Monday through Friday and sometimes Saturdays.
ST: It would be nice to have that structure. I kind of wish I had mandatory studio hours!ER: It’s interesting, I am not a morning person and 11 is early for me.
I tend to stay here until 3 or 4 am. Some of the
people here are morning people, so I envy them.
See a video of Erin weaving on her blog.
ST: Have you seen the tapestries at the Bechtler in Charlotte? Do you know if those artists (Calder, Picasso, Miro etc.) would have woven them?ER: I’ve been cooped up here so i haven’t been to the museum yet, but no way. I’m sure they sent them out to a tapestry studio. It seems to be a rather common thing nowadays for artists to send their work out to be woven into tapestries. There was an exhibition of pretty well known contemporary artists, including
Kara Walker, in NYC recently that was the same concept.
William Kentridge also did that and they were incredible, huge, like 10 feet wide and 3 or 4 women weaving at a time.
ST: Wow. Does that kind of work pay well, or does it pay nothing (translating someone else’s work?)ER: I don’t think it does, it’s just like any sort of manual labor. The artist makes the thousands and the weaver makes a wage.
ST: Weaving seems like hard work. I was reading how your back is always hurting and your fingers bleeeeeed.
ER: Yea! Haha. I’m in rough shape. Here my left wrist is killing me more than it ever has. It’s slight but I definitely worry about the long-term effects. I’ve been taking my vitamins, doing some exercises and drinking lots of water. We will see what happens. There are weavers out there who have been doing it for years.
ST:Do you mind if we talk about your Facebook series for a second?ER: Sure.
