Amy Rice Art

I use nontraditional printmaking methods–including hand cut stencils and a 1980’s Japanese screen printing toy called a Gocco printer–as a starting point for original mixed media pieces. I use enamel spray paint, acrylics, gouache, and inks, and print on a variety of surfaces including wood, fabric and antique papers (preferring handwritten love letters, envelopes, journal pages, sheet music and maps).

I am most satisfied when I can make a tangible or visceral connection between the materials used and the image rendered. My work is deeply layered, often both literally and figuratively. My imagery–nostalgic and wistful–is largely biographical and reflective of my pensive nature.

I have exhibited my work extensively at galleries in the US and beyond. I have received multiple grants and commissions, including a Minnesota State Arts Board Artist Initiative Grant, a Metropolitan Regional Arts Board Next Step Grant, and most recently in 2017, a completed a large commission for Augsburg University in Minneapolis.

In 2010 my art was featured on the Minnesota Public Television series Minnesota Original.  In the interview I stated that I was making a creative shift from painting my present and my past to painting my present and what I wanted my future to look like.  The segment ends with me asserting that I believe I will have the cabin on a lake with a swan paddle boat and big gardens (the topics of my paintings at the time of the filming). It’s been 8 years and I have the cabin. It’s tiny and on a creek and not a lake, I’m still looking for that elusive swan paddle boat, but I do in fact have the big gardens. I’ve painted dogs before I met them and flowers before I grew them. I have side-by side art and photos where the art came first and it seems like some sort of alchemy, but it’s really nothing more then goal setting in paint.

Much of my current work is my to-do list and my stretch goals. I’m not satisfied anymore with a big garden; I want acres of stripes of living colors. I want my fields to be my canvas and flowers to be my paint. Slowly, year by hard working year it’s happening. My paintings are just a few steps ahead of my reality.

Art-A-Whirl

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Amy Rice Art is open on Friday, Saturday & Sunday of Art-A-Whirl weekend.