Inside the Studio
Rebeca on "Ghost Garden"
Hand-painted on Crêpe de Chine silk, Rebeca Raney's silk paintings feature a roster of recurring characters, flowers, and ghosts. For PULSE Miami Beach, Rebeca's work was suspended to create Ghost Garden, a maximalist installation that served as a site for visitors to gather, pause, and connect. Activated by airflow in the tent, the installation revealed ripples of movement as the loose components shifted and waved, evoking a suspended garden.
We go behind the scenes to see how the silk paintings come together in the studio before the fair.
In the beginning, the silk is white and the resist that I use is a cream-colored goop. The quickly drying resist makes the whole picture nearly invisible. Painting with dye is a big revelation because it feels like I am undoing a puzzle. I enjoy that the methodical process doesn't hide mistakes. Small areas where the dye travels out of bounds or leaks prove that these works aren't printed. This is a big deal. It's easy to assume that these works are printed. I try to get them close to a personal ideal but my hand and clumsiness aren't lost.
Rebeca Raney
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