NRS is proud to announce the release of “Finding The Line,” a short film by Katie Hake that explores the relationship between art and the outdoors and the gradual unveiling of who we are meant to be.
Alexandra Riesco (or “Chachi,” as her friends call her), didn’t always plan on being an artist. She didn’t plan on being a kayaker, either. As Chachi developed her confidence on the river, learning to read water and evaluate risk, to find and follow the flow, she also learned to trust her instincts as an artist and carve her own line through life.
“The idea of becoming an artist, I think, was almost the hardest thing about it,” she says. “Deciding, ‘I ‘m going to be an artist,’ or ‘I am an artist, and just keep making work.”
Scoring thick lines into a linoleum tile, Riesco watches as her latest piece—a reductive linocut—slowly unfolds. The snaking twists and turns of a river swirl in on themselves, a study of past and present and an ode to the beauty and power of nature. It is art imitates life that imitates art, both inspiration and process drawn from the landscapes and rivers she explores on foot and by kayak. “You’re really just putting yourself at the mercy of the water or the river. You’re only sort of in control. It’s similar to when you are working on a piece, there is that back and forth of finding the right path or the right mark or the right line.”