Annie Riga
Degree: Fine Art
University: Falmouth University
Graduation Year: 2018
New Blood Art Statement
Falmouth University graduate, Annie Riga, harmonises the content of the otherworld - a place rife with nature, glittering stars, and fierce magic… with a more grounded realistic worldview, to create enigmatic visions.
Take for example, ’Sometimes We Are Not Sleeping', the deity-like subject of this piece finds themselves lost within an illuminous cosmos, though within this incomprehensible place, our subject begins to explore with composure and nobility.
Riga is intriguing for her use of the otherworld as a metaphor, but also her dazzling palette and unique mark-making.
Artist Statement
I am a multi-disciplinary artist that lives between Greece and the Netherlands. I make art through the disciplines of painting, collage and fused glass.
Through my art practice I reflect on the interconnectivity between humans and the natural world as a way to oppose the currently anthropocentric worldview that dominates our planet. I often capture humans in meditative states surrounded by blooming natural worlds, outer-space, microcosms and animals; all depicted together as one interdependent organism.
Dream imagery, mythology, and folklore; the use of archaic symbolism as well as the narrative of spiritual animals are very important aspects of my work. By placing a human figure in a dialogue with an animal, I am reminiscing our past equality with the natural world, a world that has now been replaced by the human-centric era of capitalism, pollution and environmental disruptions. However, by looking back I also gaze forward into a utopian future where our world’s natural balance has been restored.
In trying to find the connection between spirit and matter, conscious and unconscious, human and nature, I am constantly re-discovering that creativity is the building bridge between these oppositions.
Solo Exhibitions
2019, The Power of Art, DES, Athens, Greece
Group Exhibitions
2019, Outdoor Galleries - Urban Facelift, Athens School of Fine Arts, Athens, Greece
2018, Happiness Project, DES, Athens, Greece
2018, Labyrinth Fall, DES, Athens, Greece
2018, Falmouth FA Graduate Show, Falmouth, UK
2017, Falmouth FA, The Poly, Falmouth, UK
2017, Orange Sailors, Tzihritzis Foundation of the Visual Arts, Athens, Greece
2017, Thrown Gauntlet Festival, Falmouth, UK
2016, Final Year Exhibition, Campion School, Athens, Greece
Competitions, Prizes & Awards
2012, Artist of the year, Campion School
2014, Artist of the year, Campion School
2015, Artist of the year, Campion School