River Huston has been painting for 35 years. She combines her artwork with her career as a poet, performer and writer. Besides gallery and museum exhibits in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands, Mexico, California and Florida, she has shown her work at her performances, which range from international conferences in South Africa to rural churches in the Southern United States.

She spent two years as the co-director of Alternative Arts Alliance In The Virgin Islands and was involved with teaching outreach classes in the community as well as being the resident artist at sevenminusseven art gallery.

Her paintings are primary abstract impressionism and they appear over years or minutes. The work is highly textured and is made with a combination of found materials from coffee grounds to concrete. The base is acrylic applied to canvas or paper.

River Huston is the author of three books of poetry, Jesus Never Lived Here, The Bones of Susan and In Which I lost 1000 Pounds. She was awarded the Dorthea Lang/Paul Taylor award for A Positive Life: Portraits Of Women Living With HIV. She is the creator of Goddess: A New Guide to Feminine Wisdom and SEXED: Tales of a Textrix.

Her other awards include the 2009 Leeway Transformation Award, Rutgers Beacon of Hope Award and was named Poet Laureate, Bucks County, Pennsylvania.

For 11 years River wrote a sex column for POZ magazine and in 1990 she earned a BA in Health Education and Music from Hunter College and in 1995 she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Albright College for her work around sexual health.

She has performed several solo shows including Sex, Cellulite and Large Farm Equipment: One Girl’s Guide to Living and Dying and SEXED in theaters, conferences and colleges nationwide.

River currently resides in Santa Monica, CA where she works in her downtown studio.

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