About Farrah Riley Gray
Riley Gray’s practice has a focus on misogynoir and the experiences of Black Women. Working through textiles, audio, and text, how marginalised communities can be given representation in-with art and art spaces. Her focus in a modern-day archival of the stories and skills passed down to her.
Riley Gray is interested in the rituals in fabric and weaving materials, how they can convey relationships between culture, race, gendered product making; and their possibility to hold a story of an individual or group. She believes that textiles are often highly emotional for their makers and owners, and due to being associated with women’s work, it has led to it being a means to document women’s histories. In particular, Black Women, whose stories are often erased. While also considering there to be a language in fabric and other weaving materials, that can tell us about being in a diaspora that other archival or historical sources, such as those that are written, cannot; or that has been whitewashed and/or appropriated by western culture.
Riley Gray is currently Youth Platform Coordinator and Project Assistant for Create Civic Change at Peckham Platform.
Education
BA Fine Art Goldsmiths Graduate 2019
Upcoming Shows
2022 Hair, Untold Stories Tullie House Museum
2022 Hair, Untold Stories Weston Park Museum
Current shows
Gallery 31: Piece of Mind Somerset House
Past Shows
2021-22 Hair, Untold Stories Horniman Museum
2021 Untitled Harlesden High Street Gallery
2021 Maker’s Eye: Stories of Craft Craft Council
2020 After Hours Bowes-Parris Gallery
2020 Harlesden Safari Shop Vol 1: Where do we go from here? Harlesden High Street
2020 Weaving Archives Goldsmiths
2020 I Am Not Disabled, the Institution is Disabled as part of No End and No Beginning Wellcome Collection
2019 Community Calling The Bohemians
2019 Knotted Deptford X
2019 Knotted Christine Risley Award
Constance Howard Gallery, Deptford Town Hall, Goldsmiths
2019 Goldsmiths BA Fine Art Degree Show, Goldsmiths
2019 The Valve Installation, Matchstick Theatre
2018 The Colour Of Madness Book Launch, Ugly Duck
2014 Invasion Take Courage Gallery
2013 4.3 Kilometers to Utopia Junction Pushkin Gallery
2012-2013 The Body Adorned: Dressing London Horniman Museum
Residencies
2020 Harlesden High Street
Publications and Print
2022: The Colour Of Madness Anthology: Exploring BAME Mental Health in the UK Revisited (Samara Linton, Rianna Walcott)
2021: Artists Explore the Social Presence of Blackness Art Review
2019 Artist to Watch Contemporary Art Society
2019 Goldsmiths Graduate Weaves Hidden Histories With Hair The Voice
2018 “I Finger a Coil of my Hair and Tug” The Colour Of Madness Anthology: Exploring BAME Mental Health in the UK (Samara Linton, Rianna Walcott)
Talks and Interviews
2022: The Show Windows: Reflection - Alternative Artists Historic England and Coventry City of Culture Trust
2021: Race and representation: Who gets to tell stories UAL
2020: Weaving Archives as part of Anthropology in the Making Goldsmiths
2020: Re-imagining Care and Community: Centring Black Womxn Centre for Feminist Research
2020: Afro Hair Futurity with Alix Bizet: Episode 2 Self Design Academy of Eindhoven, Holland
https://www.sharouh.com/category/sound-design/
2019: Black and Disabled Goldsmiths
2019: Christine Risley Award
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcHIkEFQQTU
Workshops
2020 A Space to Hold Space as part of No End and No Beginning Wellcome Collection
2019 Caring Space Goldsmiths
Awards
2019 Christine Risley Award Winner
https://www.gold.ac.uk/textile-collection/christine-risley/previous-recipients/2019---farrah-riley-gray/
2018 “Mischief and Magic” Photography Runner Up, Ben Uri Gallery and Museum
Work
2020-ongoing Project Assistant for Create Civic Change Peckham Platform
2020 Community Fieldworker Horniman Museum
2020-ongoing Youth Platform Coordinator Peckham Platform
2019 Youth Platform Assistant Peckham Platform