Rachel McClain Ferber

Frames for Unacknowledged Voids (FENDI & rubber bands), 2026 Buy a print and support Columbus Printed Arts Center’s incredible new space! @cpca.studio

Some things to think about — catch them at the opening of Reading Room at @100000000space tonight! plastic spoon takeaways, 2025 double-sided 3-color Risograph print on new old stock paper, paperboard, padding compound (Left) 8 x 10 x 4 inches & (Right) 5 x 8 x 4 inches Composed of the same materials as the books they support—paper, ink, information and ideas—these bookends are stacks of double-sided Risograph prints that offer another mode of content sharing within the reading room. Visitors are invited to take a set of the tearaway prints which will slowly decrease in height and effectiveness over the duration of the exhibition. In taking away the material, they are left with two takeaways to consider: “according to a 2025 study, the human brain may contain as much at 7 grams of microplastics—the weight of a plastic spoon.” and “what did the plastic spoon scoop away to make room for itself?’ The black and white images on the prints are enlarged reproductions from one of the included reading materials—Fairburn Figures and Hands—and the spoon image is a to-scale reproduction of a color-changing plastic spoon encountered at a local Cleveland ice cream shop. Thank you to @adamspuryear for including me in this important project.

Stop by the @cleinstituteart_iml to view the beta animated version of “saying NO means saying YES to something else (float sequence)” on the 32:9 seamless LED screen. Or drive by — viewable from Euclid Ave! 32:9 or two-channel 4K video 10:00 loop Still some animations to add for the final edit, but I’m obsessed with the quality of the light! Image materials include: cucumber pulp paper weathered plastic scraps found on the shore of Lake Erie — Cleveland, Ohio construction paper VOID cutouts chain of paper clips saved from clothing tags coffee filter with the residue of green vegetable scrap pigment YES written in dry erase marker circle drawn in dry erase marker Camoren’s Crayon [beeswax candle remnants, green vegetable scrap pigment, found crayon wrapper] dried apple core produce tag Flashcards (Grass) [anthotype print on hot-press watercolor paper made with pigment derived from grass clippings] frames drawn in crayon vegetable twist tie weaving found rubber bands zip tie found on the street in Victoria BC, Canada America’s Pencil™ U.S.A Gold® #2 pencil Extra Flashcards & TESTING (Grass) [anthotype print on hot-press watercolor paper made with pigment derived from grass clippings] construction paper VOID weaving Emma’s Crayon [beeswax candle remnants, onion skin pigment, turmeric, found crayon wrapper] smudge in dry erase marker Test Pattern (Beet) [anthotype print on hot-press watercolor paper made with pigment derived from beet greens and trimmings] dried miniature daffodil found foam scraps Katie’s Crayon [beeswax candle remnants, avocado pit pigment, found crayon wrapper] found pipe cleaner used PH test strips piece of paper—folded in half—faded from a summer spent in a window NO written in dry erase marker dried tomato vine color-changing plastic spoon

More from the studio recently 🥒 👇🏼 inefficient green screen tests, 2025 4K video 02:30 duration This work is an excerpt from a larger work in progress, entitled exercises in saying NO, which explores slowness and inefficiency as modes of resisting capitalist pressures and value systems. An inefficient green screen blocks any desired manipulation of the image. It makes the material tangible and the tool visible—disrupting the slick, texture-free ideals of consumer culture through seemingly ineffective actions. Made largely from discarded materials, the green screens activated in the video are object-based questions—props that ask us to consider more sustainable socio-environmental and material relationships. On view at @reinbergergallery Aug 28–Oct 5

Happy first day of school! 🖍️ fugitive crayons (tools for relearning) are a series of jumbo crayon replicas that have been remade using domestic material discards—beeswax candle remnants and vegetable scraps. Cast in molds made from the original used crayons, these new tools are desaturated versions of the forms with which we are so familiar. Their marks are similarly alternative; subtle and fleeting, the pigmentation fades with exposure to sunlight. What might these alternative communication tools teach us? How might we reestablish our relationships to material, time and value through marks that ultimately disappear? What possibilities lie in the spaces of impossibility? These works are small sculptural questions that I am currently considering through activation in videos, drawings and text-based forms. The reuse of the original crayon wrappers is an acknowledgment of their previous caretakers and a nudge to reinhabit the exploratory minds of our younger selves. Camoren’s Crayon, 2025 beeswax candle remnants, pigment derived from kale stems & kohlrabi greens, found jumbo crayon wrapper .5 × 4 × .5 inches Katie’s Crayon, 2025 beeswax candle remnants, pigment derived from avocado pits, found jumbo crayon wrapper .5 × 4 × .5 inches Emma’s Crayon, 2025 beeswax candle remnants, pigment derived from onion skins & turmeric, found jumbo crayon wrapper .5 × 4 × .5 inches Josh’s Crayon, 2025 beeswax candle remnants, pigment derived from kale stems & kohlrabi greens; avocado pits; onion skins & turmeric, found jumbo crayon wrapper .5 × 4 × .5 inches

saying NO means saying YES to something else, 2025 11 archival pigment prints 12 × 16 inches each (13.5 feet × 16 inches total when installed) If you’re in Peoria, Illinois you can view this work in MAKE | BELIEVE at Heuser Art Gallery and Hartmann Center Gallery 8.18–10.3! Image materials include: cucumber pulp paper weathered plastic scraps found on the shore of Lake Erie — Cleveland, Ohio construction paper VOID cutouts chain of paper clips saved from clothing tags coffee filter with the residue of green vegetable scrap pigment YES written in dry erase marker circle drawn in dry erase marker Camoren’s Crayon [beeswax candle remnants, green vegetable scrap pigment, found crayon wrapper] dried apple core produce tag Flashcards (Grass) [anthotype print on hot-press watercolor paper made with pigment derived from grass clippings] frames drawn in crayon vegetable twist tie weaving found rubber bands zip tie found on the street in Victoria BC, Canada America’s Pencil™ U.S.A Gold® #2 pencil Extra Flashcards & TESTING (Grass) [anthotype print on hot-press watercolor paper made with pigment derived from grass clippings] construction paper VOID weaving Emma’s Crayon [beeswax candle remnants, onion skin pigment, turmeric, found crayon wrapper] smudge in dry erase marker Test Pattern (Beet) [anthotype print on hot-press watercolor paper made with pigment derived from beet greens and trimmings] dried miniature daffodil found foam scraps Katie’s Crayon [beeswax candle remnants, avocado pit pigment, found crayon wrapper] found pipe cleaner used PH test strips piece of paper—folded in half—faded from a summer spent in a window NO written in dry erase marker dead fly dried tomato vine color-changing plastic ice cream spoon

I’ve been chipping away at a website redesign all summer and it’s finally LIVE! More work updates coming soon, but if you like you can preview now. 🖇️ link in bio

I made this little video mantra a few months ago for “Love is Resistance” at @transformerstation and am finally getting around to sharing. AI #gwynthpaltrow is back — trying to figure out the cadence of this idea. Reflecting on time, productivity and materiality. Do I only have time to look at the sky if it’s constructed, artificial and in pursuit of an end product? Material Meditation (Sky), 2025 4K video 02:55 duration

If you’re in Boston today you can stop by the @specific___ideas table at @multipleformats fair and pick up a copy of ~ soft-focus edges & olfactory funk ~ an artist book/tool kit exploring slowness, inefficiency and communication forms that use “disappearing inks” made from food waste as speculative modes of resistance. waste time. not material. #anthotype #resistance

TEST testing: gestures of resistance closes tonight — opening reception and book launch from 4-6pm! Come eat cheese and contemplate the power of using your time inefficiently with me 🧀 📖 🍷 #gwynethpaltrow

For the last few months, I’ve been discreetly exploring some new ideas in a shipping container in Akron, Ohio. AI #gwynethpaltrow reads my words here to narrate a broken line of communication — highlighting the limitations and strangeness of this technology and the hyper-productivity it enables (and perhaps, demands). Things will continue to breakdown at the closing reception & BOOK LAUNCH — Saturday, November 2 from 4-6pm — 110 N Main St — Hope to see you there. @curatedstorefront