Riley is interested in visual effects, commenting:
The eye can travel over the surface in a way parallel to the way it moves over nature. It should feel caressed and soothed, experience frictions and ruptures, glide and drift. One moment, there will be nothing to look at and the next second the canvas seems to refill, to be crowded with visual events.
She also continues to work in black, white and gray, although gray is largely an illusion of overlapping circles. In Riley’s large mural, Composition with Circles (1998), the disks construct a volatile and dynamic space of overlapping transparent circles. While stressing the importance of “clarity of color, order of mind…no gratuitous brushwork,” Riley also recognizes the relationship between music and painting, as did artists such as Kandinsky.
You can listen to Riley discussing the development of her painting by clicking the audio play button, above.