February 27 – March 27
Reception: Friday, March 6, 5–8pm
Location: Apex Gallery, Tandem Press, 1743 Commercial Ave, Madison, WI, Open Wednesday-Friday, 10am-4pm
Inspired by her experiences living in several disparate environments, Alexandra Riesco creates records of place and movement through printed and handmade paper pieces. In images that oscillate between abstract and representational, microscopic and macroscopic, she studies the ground closely through a scientific lens, exploring the idea of home in a time of uncertainty and the integral connection between humans and the environment.
Riesco is an artist and printmaker from Miami, Florida. Her work is heavily influenced by the natural world and the dynamic processes that drive it. After completing a semester-long geology field program, she discovered the parallels between the forces that shape the planet and the slow, physical processes of printmaking. Her interest in the sciences and deep love for the outdoors feeds her practice, which incorporates drawing, printmaking, and papermaking to explore the bodily experience of the landscape, mapping and the geologic record, and the possibilities of a reciprocal rather than controlling relationship with the environment.
Riesco received her B.A. in Studio Art and Biology modified with Earth Sciences from Dartmouth College in 2017, where she won the Robert Read Prize and the Artist’s Book Prize. After spending a few years working in outdoor education, Riesco returned to printmaking and has worked as an assistant printer, workshop instructor, and manager of a fine art print publisher. She is currently pursuing a Master of Fine Arts degree in Printmaking from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where she received the Graduate Research Scholars Fellowship from the School of Education, and is the 2025-2026 Studio Curatorial Project Assistant at Tandem Press.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison Art MFA Qualifier Exhibition season continues with Alexandra Riesco’s art exhibition. The qualifier solo exhibitions are presented by the graduate students during their fourth semester as the evaluation review of their creative work to qualify for advancement in the MFA program. Come view the work and research by our newest cohort of developing artists!
This exhibition is supported by the Anonymous Fund.