The Global Paddling Community

Scoring thick lines into a linoleum tile, Alexandra 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.”

“Chachi,” as her friends call her, didn’t always plan on being an artist. She didn’t plan on being a kayaker, either. As she 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. Deciding, ‘I 'm going to be an artist,’ or ‘I am an artist, and just keep making work.”

Watch the unexpected intersection of art and the outdoors in Finding the Line, a short film by Katie Hake.