Photo by Jonathon Andre’ Beckle
BIO
CHERYL R. RILEY is a Multi-Media Artist, Furniture Designer and Art Advisor whose focus is artists of the Black African Diaspora. She creates wall art, installations, site-specific public artworks, and custom designs for corporate titans and celebrity clients. Her works are in the permanent collections of Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt Museum of Design, Smithsonian Museum of African American History & Culture, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMoMA), Brooklyn Museum, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), the Mint Museum of Art & Design and Oakland Museum. Public works are the San Francisco Bayview Police Station Public Lobby and Community Conference Room, The Sacramento Pannel Meadowview Community Center entry wall mural, The City University of New York, Sheppard Hall “Gothic Kuba Glass Window Panels I-IV, Atlanta Hartsfield Airport “African Textiles Glass Panels I-V”, among others. She is a former board member at several museums as well as on the first site-specific artist residency in the U.S.--Capp Street Project. In 2023, she joined the Executive and Finance boards of the Museum of Art & Design (MAD) in New York City for a second term.
She creates wall art, installations, site-specific public artworks, and custom designs for corporate and celebrity clients. Her works are in the permanent collections of Smithsonian Museums—the Cooper-Hewitt Museum of Design and The National Museum of African American History & Culture. She is also in the collections of SFMoMA, LACMA, the Oakland Museum and the Mint Museum of Art & Design. She recently received a commission and designed the "World History I (Drum), 2024” table for the Brooklyn Museum. After returning on loan from the Montreal Museum of Fine Art, her Zulu Renaissance Writing Table for a Lady, 1995, was on view in the “Surreal Connections” permanent collection gallery of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Its popularity with Visitors led to the creation of a film taping about this sculpture. She is a former board member at several museums, organization such as SECA (Society for the Encouragement of Contemporary Art), as well as the first site-specific artist residency in the U.S.--Capp Street Project. She joined the Executive and Finance board of the Museum of Art & Design (MAD) in New York City for a second term in 2024. She is an NEA Individual Artist Grant recipient among others. She has won fellowships for and attended numerous artists residencies and will be a fellow at the Frank Lloyd Wright “The Martin House” masterpiece in Buffalo, New York the Fall of 2024.
Cheryl is an occasional Art Advisor to celebrities such as the movie, television and Broadway actor, Jesse Williams. She has also curated collections for a condo development in Harlem, numerous corporate titans and corporations such as BET. Her focus for decades in this practice has been Artists of the Black African Diaspora.
You may view my resume here.
MEDIA
Museum of Art and Design: Artist Interview 2000