The dolled up rotten fruits of Kathleen Ryan

The Californian artist has become known worldwide for her incredible jewelry sculptures of decaying food.

"The sculptures are beautiful and very enjoyable, but they are always accompanied by ugliness and restlessness."

These are words that the sculptor Kathleen Ryan told the New York Times a year ago. The purpose of the report was to find out how it was possible for an artist to achieve critical applause and fame within the world based on creating false rotten fruits, where the rottenness, however, is made precisely with, in theory, the most beautiful : precious and semi-precious stones.

Eight weeks of work to “rot” your precious fruits

This Californian born in Santa Monica in 1984 plays with this dichotomy using amethyst or marble, taking her 8 weeks of work on average to create, in large works made of concrete or iron, the mold that covers food in poor condition, as in her last exhibition at the François Ghebaly gallery in Los Angeles, can be seen in a huge bunch of grapes or slices of watermelon infected with fungus and insects.

Kathleen Ryan's hidden message to her collectors.

The artist believes that her works "are not just opulent, but inherently contain the idea of ​​decline" and she makes this known in a hidden message to future collectors of her works. For her it is something that is also happening in the world, given that "wealth inequality is increasing at the expense of the environment" , which is why she uses glass in different shades for the 'non-rotten' parts of her sculptures:

Mold is decomposition, but it is the most living part.

kathleen ryan