About

Rachel Kokko is a California-based artist whose work explores landscape as a living system shaped by accumulation, erosion, and human intervention. Known for her evolving body of folded-paper sculptures, Kokko creates dimensional terrains that exist between abstraction and cartography. Her work transforms hand-dyed, sustainable papers into intricate reliefs that evoke topography, cellular structures, and geological formations, inviting viewers to reconsider how land is formed, altered, and remembered.

Born and raised in the Bay Area, Kokko was immersed in art from an early age under the influence of her mother, a sculptor. This early exposure to material exploration and three-dimensional thinking continues to inform her practice today. She went on to study Illustration at ArtCenter College of Design, where she developed a strong foundation in composition, color, and visual storytelling.

Following her studies, Kokko spent four years working as a finish artist in a print advertising studio, producing large-scale campaigns for major film studios including Pixar, DreamWorks, Disney, and Universal. During this time, she was responsible for the final execution of billboards, movie posters, and global print materials, developing a high level of precision, technical fluency, and sensitivity to detail that continues to shape her meticulous approach to construction and surface.

Alongside her commercial work, Kokko exhibited pop surrealist paintings in galleries across Los Angeles and nationally, including a curated exhibition at Gallery 1988. Her early work was characterized by richly layered acrylic compositions, imaginative narratives, and a strong influence from animation, pattern, and visual storytelling.

After relocating to Napa Valley, her practice underwent a significant shift. Surrounded by agricultural land, mapped terrain, and the visible imprint of human cultivation on the landscape, she became increasingly interested in systems of land use, topography, and environmental change. This transition led to the development of her ongoing body of work, Geofolds.

In Geofolds, Kokko uses thousands of hand-folded paper units to construct sculptural landscapes that balance precision and intuition. Some works are rooted in real geography, translating elevation and terrain into physical form. Others are speculative, shaped by process and material response rather than map accuracy. Across both approaches, the work reflects the tension between control and unpredictability, stability and disruption.

Paper, a material often associated with fragility, is engineered for longevity and used deliberately as a metaphor for environmental systems that appear resilient yet remain vulnerable to cumulative change. Individual elements, delicate on their own, become structurally and visually powerful when assembled, echoing the interconnected nature of ecosystems.

Kokko’s work does not depict specific environmental events, but instead captures landscapes in flux, shaped by visible and invisible forces. Through color, texture, and form, her pieces suggest processes such as compression, erosion, cultivation, and transformation, offering a nuanced reflection on the ways human activity continues to reshape the Earth.

Now based in Napa Valley, Kokko creates from her home studio, producing large-scale, textural works that function as both visual experiences and conceptual terrains. Her work invites sustained looking, encouraging viewers to consider not just what they see, but how landscapes evolve over time and under pressure.