From Kilns to Coral Reefs: Ashley Rivers Builds What Can’t Be Contained

By Avery Anderson

There’s a sculpture at the Tully Levine Gallery right now that looks like it crash-landed from another realm. Towering and tactile, cracked and vibrant, Ashley Rivers’ Bird of Paradise doesn’t just stand—it summons. Made of metal and thrumming with elemental energy, the piece feels less like a static object and more like a ritual in mid-transformation.

It’s a fitting symbol for an artist whose practice defies neat categories. Rivers is a multidisciplinary force: a sculptor, mover, poet, and performance artist whose work often blurs the lines between medium and meaning. Her pieces can show up in galleries, on beaches, at community events—or, in one case, on the ocean floor.

“My work often depicts stages of a journey relating to the earth, our human identities, and even emotions,” she said. “I start with a simple impulse or urge, and it develops and transforms into something multilayered and indefinable.”

Some pieces emerge from clay, others from concrete or metal. Many are shaped around the human body—not for its perfection, but for its emotional resonance. Her work vibrates with contradiction: cracked and strong, grounded and cosmic, soft and powerful.

And at the heart of it all—both the philosophy and the name she works under—is fire.

What fire knows—and what Ashley Rivers has learned to accept

“The Nature of Fire,” the moniker that guides Rivers’ creative identity, isn’t just poetic branding. It’s a metaphor, a medium, and a mindset—rooted in her early experiences working with clay.

“Fire is a key element for many art practices, but for ceramic specifically, fire has a deep presence,” she explained. “Artists throughout history who worked with clay attempted to control fire in so many ways… but what is crazy is that, no matter what you do, you are never going to be able to completely control what happens with fire.”

For Rivers, that unpredictability is both the problem and the point.

“It’s unstable, imperfect, alive, and yet completely natural. It does what it wants,” she said. “I feel like we as individuals are very similar to fire.”

Sculptures as portals, bodies as metaphor

While Rivers often moves between mediums, sculpture has become a central part of her practice—especially works that explore what she calls “the connection we as individuals feel and have towards nature, the world we live in, and how we experience life.”

She frequently incorporates human figures into her sculptural work, not to idealize the body but to anchor it.

“I find using a figure creates stronger emotions within the artworks overall because it gives the viewer something that they can relate to. Something that is familiar.”

The results often feel like portals. Viewers are invited to look through them—not just at them—into something deeper, more archetypal, and personal.

“I wish I could say my art is whole-heartedly uplifting and happy all the time, but it's not. I make works from my soul—and that includes all of the energies I feel—good or bad!”

The turning point: a cracked aesthetic takes root

One of the major pivots in Rivers’ artistic journey came in 2022, when she received a Creative Pinellas grant to develop a new body of work. It became a breakthrough—not just in visibility, but in voice.

“The sculptures I created for that show have really shaped the new and unique style of sculpture that I feel like I have been well-known for,” she said.

That style—marked by cracked surfaces and layered textures—now runs through much of her practice, a kind of visual signature. But she’s still evolving.

“I have hopes and research I have been working on for a future series that will really test the limits of this style,” she said.

Beyond the gallery: landscapes, kilns, and letting go

Rivers doesn’t confine her work to traditional art spaces. In addition to galleries, she’s made site-specific work for beaches and even the sea floor. (Her contribution to the Underwater Museum of Art in Walton County required adapting her approach to entirely different materials.)

She’s also shaped by what the process of artmaking offers her—especially when it comes to sculpture.

“I think I always end up coming back to clay because the process of working with it can feel very ritualistic,” she said. “To become so fully enveloped in the making of a piece, that all of the outside world goes away… worries dissolve for a while, and I can just leave the world at the door.”

What’s next: Portals, collaborations, and one fierce tropical bird

This August and September, Rivers' Bird of Paradise sculpture will be on view at the Tully Levine Gallery as part of the MADE HERE exhibition. Unlike much of her earlier work in clay, Bird of Paradise is made of metal—a shift in medium, but not in power. It’s lush, fierce, and unmistakably hers.

She’s also working on a conservation-focused collaboration with another local artist, though she’s keeping details under wraps for now.

“I definitely have a few projects up my sleeves that I’m happy about,” she said. “But I can’t spill too many beans yet!”

What we can say: whether it’s clay, concrete, or metal, Ashley Rivers’ work doesn’t just sit quietly in the room. It glows.

If You Go

Bird of Paradise Sculpture 🗓 Opening Night: August 12, 2025, 5–9 p.m. during ArtWalk 📍 Tully Levine Gallery, St. Petersburg 🎨 On view through September as part of the MADE HERE exhibition

Follow Ashley’s work at @thenatureoffire on Instagram.