From a young age, I was captivated by death – not in a morbid sense, but as an unanswerable mystery. I couldn’t comprehend how someone could simply vanish, leaving behind only a body. What exactly dissolved in death? What vanished, leaving only silence where there was once the laughter, voice, warmth, and motion of a living, breathing person?
These questions lingered and grew, evolving from quiet childhood curiosity into a deeper inquiry into the human condition. It left me with an overwhelming desire to understand death not as a terrifying end, but as part of a larger, inevitable process. Over time, I found myself gravitating toward representations of decay not with disgust, but with reverence. To me, decomposition is a transformation – a natural transition into what lies beyond, if anything does. It is a humbling and awe-inspiring return to the earth, a reminder that all things, including ourselves, are in constant flux – always transient, never permanent.
This perspective led me to study death rituals and artistic practices that approach mortality with clarity and reverence. Buddhist monks and laypeople, for instance, meditated on decaying female bodies to transcend physical attachment and cultivate detachment. In Japan, the practice of kusōzu, or the “paintings of the nine stages of decay,” allowed for reflection on impermanence and spiritual liberation. Similarly, medieval Christian traditions used ars moriendi texts and memento mori imagery such as skulls, cadavers, and rotting flesh, to encourage acceptance of death as a spiritual transition, not a finality.
These traditions, though culturally distinct, each regard death as a process of becoming rather than erasure. That belief is central to my current project: a mixed media painting series exploring feminine decomposition as both sacred and sublime. Through these multi-media works, I will depict stages of decay in the feminine form. These works do not shy away from the grotesque. Instead, they exalt it, treating the breaking down of the body as a ritual, a passage, and a source of power.
Drawing inspiration from artists like Fuyuko Matsui, Agostino Arrivabene, and Jeremy Hush, I aim to capture the beauty of ephemerality. Their works deal with death and transformation with meticulous care, spiritual depth, and haunting tenderness. Using baroque chiaroscuro lighting to dramatize each stage of decomposition, I hope to create a sense of reverence and stillness, reminding viewers that decay is not the enemy of beauty, but a part of it.
I do not want to completely beautify decay in an unrealistic and superficial sense, though. A huge part of my research project will be observing active decay in human bodies under the supervision of a licensed mortician, reflecting on the process as a means of understanding the historical and religious pretenses that this project draws from. Ultimately, my goal is not to make decay beautiful in a conventional sense, but to illuminate the beauty that already exists within it. Therefore, through these paintings, I invite viewers to confront what we are taught to turn away from, and instead, find meaning, grace, and even beauty in the body’s most vulnerable states.
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