Working in collaboration, artist Stephanie Kilgast and illustrator Miles Johnston have conceptualized a limited edition series of surrealistic sculptures that showcase the tragic beauty found in decomposition. The 12-piece project features sorrowful women as they hold a decaying being in their arms. The kneeling ladies (created with casts by MoonCrane Press) are clad in white and fused with the dripping figures adorned in an array of rainbow hues with fungus-like growths on their bodies.
Johnston came up with the idea for the series—specifically, of a woman crying over a decomposing human. “I added life with my mushrooms, because, whatever happens, life always keeps going,” Kilgast explains. “Even if it’s just on a bacterial level.” And although the original concept was sadness over a person wasting away, Kilgast offers an alternative interpretation of the pieces. “Another way of seeing this sculpture is to see the woman crying not over a human being but over the sixth mass extinction of nature that is currently happening.”
Regardless of how you chose to view the series, the concept of loss is evident. In Kilgast’s analysis, however, there is some hope—that we have the ability to change our own behavior and lessen our catastrophic impact on the planet.
Artist Stephanie Kilgast and illustrator Miles Johnston collaborated on a surrealistic sculpture series featuring sorrowful women as they hold a decaying being in their arms.