SHOWING AT MOORES BUILDING ART SPACE

Rachel Riggs is a multidisciplinary Fremantle artist whose practice spans painting, collage, assemblage, and installation. Originally trained at the Royal Central School in London, she worked extensively in theatre and television before turning her focus toward visual art. Between 2003 and 2009 she was an education artist with Tate Britain, Tate Modern and Tate Liverpool, leading community and youth programs.

Following a Master of Fine Arts in Site & Archive under the mentorship of Lubaina Himid CBE at the University of Central Lancashire (2010), Riggs relocated to Australia, where she has developed participatory creative arts programs for children and families. Her current project, The HOME Program, connects children’s wellbeing to nature through art-making at The Wetlands Centre, Bibra Lake, with support from CITS WA.

Riggs’ visual art practice explores the social history of women through the reuse of found materials and domestic objects. Her work interlaces the female gaze, ecology, and material memory, creating contemporary collages and assemblages that examine the links between the oppression of women and the degradation of the ocean.

She has undertaken residencies at Fremantle Arts Centre (2021) and co-designed So Once You Were Here They Had You, a site-specific installation for Fremantle Biennale (2023). Recent exhibitions include Dark Feminine (Victoria Park Arts Centre, 2021), Ravenous (Carlton Club, Manchester UK, 2023) and Tipping Point (Cockburn Wetlands Centre, 2024). Her collaborative project Riggs & Miller (PSAS, Fremantle, 2022) extended her research into environment and identity.

Between the Devil & the Deep C continues this investigation, using recycled materials, light, and shadow to navigate female resilience and oceanic fragility.

Artist Bio

Rachel Riggs is a Fremantle-based multidisciplinary artist whose work spans collage, assemblage and installation. Trained at London’s Royal Central School, she previously worked with Tate Britain, Tate Modern and Tate Liverpool before completing a Master of Fine Art in Site & Archive with Lubaina Himid CBE (UCLAN, 2010).

Riggs’ practice reclaims found materials to explore the intertwined narratives of women, ecology and history. Her recent project Between the Devil & the Deep C uses recycled materials, light and shadow to reflect on the parallel degradation of the ocean and the oppression of women.

She has exhibited widely in Australia and the UK, including Fremantle Arts Centre, PS Art Space and the Fremantle Biennale. Her community-based initiative The HOME Program connects children’s wellbeing and creativity through nature at The Wetlands Centre, Bibra Lake.