Kat Ryals

Photo by, Tiffany Smith

Meet Kat Ryals

Lend me your eyes and ears my fine internet friends, and peep the incredible, delectable, lenticular work of Kat Ryals. This Brooklyn based multi-media artist hails from the great south, and draws influence from her Arkansas and Louisiana roots.

While pursuing a career in fashion photography, Ryals has turned her artistic eye to sculptures, installation, and curation. Today we talk our usual nonsense, including but not limited to; winged Chihuahuas, the influence of her creative communities, and of course, Priscilla Queen of the … Swamp…

A self-portrait by, Kat Ryals

Would You Rather

every dog in the world be replaced by giant crabs or giant bats. Please explain your answer.

Well I'm a big fan of dogs, so I'd hate to see them go... so I guess giant bats since they are close enough to winged Chihuahuas.

Some questions with Kat Ryals

How does your background in photography feed your current, sculptural work?

Many photographers enjoy photography as a tool for documenting (and I do too), but I’m more interested in it conceptually and historically. This is why I’ve tended to choose alternative photographic methods over just straight digital or film photography. I taught myself how to do dry plate tintypes, and that was my primary medium for years. It’s such a physical process. I’m interested in objecthood, and that relationship to photography. I’ve started to explore this distinction of virtual vs actual, of slow analog processes blended with mass producible digital media. I think another important aspect of how I use photography in my current work is that I do still use it for documentation, but it is for documenting things I’m building or creating rather than what already exists out in the world.

You’ve lived and worked in Savannah, Nashville, and Brooklyn. How have these communities impacted your work?

Each community has uniquely impacted my work. I grew up central Arkansas, which is not exactly known for its artist community. I was always into making art growing up – painting, drawing, taking photos. I completed a very small arts program at my all girls catholic high school (they did not encourage the arts there at all – in fact, they very much discouraged self-expression). So I was very excited to move to a creative, beautiful place like Savannah for college. It was the first time I really felt “part” of a community, let alone a creative one. I interned with a photographer in Nashville during school, and knew I wanted to get an MFA but not immediately after graduation. So, in the meantime, I chose to live in a larger, creative city (I didn’t want to move to NYC yet, and I didn’t want to go back home either). When I interned in 2009, Nashville seemed like the weird, funky mid-sized southern city I could thrive in. However, the creative scene there was so heavily biased towards musicians that it was really tough to find a visual arts community to connect with. The city also developed rapidly during my time there, and the charm that had originally appealed to me seemed to diminish. I was excited to leave. However, being there did help me to realize what I really wanted and what I was missing, and once I got to NYC I was so grateful to be here. I haven’t wasted a single moment of my time here, and I’ve been hustling to work hard on my art and professional life since I moved. People told me I wouldn’t be able to find a strong community in NYC, and that artists weren’t supportive of each other here, which was total garbage. My community here has been the strongest and most supportive I’ve ever experienced and I’m so glad to be part of it. Being an artist is a roller coaster, there are good months and bad months. However, the NYC creative community has been what has kept me going during those moments of totally wanting to give up – people here are both so inspiring and encouraging.

Do you see yourself living in NYC your whole life?

No. New York is right for my life now (I have been here 7 years – the longest I’ve lived anywhere except my hometown), but at some point, I plan to move on. Probably back to the south, closer to my family, or otherwise somewhere that’s warmer and slower.

Please define “Priscilla Queen of the Swamp” and it’s relationship to your work.

People keep finding this descriptor lol I don’t know where it is living online but I’d say its accurate. It pretty well describes my aesthetic as an artist, except maybe throw in a bit more of a Mad Max edge to it. It’s about my love of the desert as an adult, and my roots growing up in the south - the swamp. And in general, having a lifelong love of showgirls, ornaments, sparkles, etc. I think it describes my personal style more than anything. Priscilla Queen of the Desert is also a favorite film – it’s about drag queens driving through the Australian desert in their tour bus, Priscilla.

How does your interest in ornamentation shape your sculptures?

My interest in ornamentation stems from a fascination with material culture, decorative objects, fashion, and anthropology. I am interested in ornamentation as a special effect – one that can incite awe and enchantment. And I’m also interested in its power as a tool for manipulating the viewer (whether its within architecture, fashion, objects, etc). I think that how we decorate our bodies and our lives often traces back to larger, invisible systems of manipulation and power. And it feels important to recognize this. In the past, overwhelming objects and design served as this tool for subordination and enforcing hierarchies, a role that technology now seems to fill. We’re in the “electronic baroque” era, as writer Norman M. Klein calls it. My interest in all this is what drove me to start creating wearables, thinking about how we embellish individual parts of the body and I wondered what it would look like to ornament directly onto the skin. My work ends up being more critical, though, looking at mass consumption, globalization, and socio-political hierarchies. Constructing these “skins” was much like creating robes for a fictional society, which could be interpreted in a sci-fi sort of way as past, or futuristic, possibly alien, etc. To me, they are more of a reflection of our world now – but more from the reflection of a fun house mirror; caricatured. This naturally led to me to produce what I imagine their material culture would be, based on historic objects of status or power such as chandeliers, tapestries or rugs, trophies, robes, lush gardens, etc.

Who are your greatest influences as an artist?

When I first moved to NYC, I really fell in love with Mike Kelly’s work when I saw his retrospective at MoMaPs1. I think seeing that show at a critical moment of change in my work was exactly what I needed – I had just moved up here for grad school after feeling stifled in Nashville and was entering into a wild mode of experimentation. I’ve always been a big fan of Nick Cave. My studio conversations with Vito Acconci in grad school definitely left a big impact on me. I’m mostly influenced by the work of other artists dealing with futurism and anthropology, finding ways to make work about the body or the figure in unconventional ways, often tying in fashion, craft and sculpture. Fashion designers like Jean Paul Gaultier and Jeremy Scott, artists like Saya Woolfalk and Raul De Nieves, filmmakers like John Waters and David Lynch are among those influences. So much film has influenced by practice as well and I LOVE Sci-fi. After re-watching the original film, I just started the Westworld HBO series and I’m already super into it. Very excited for the new release of Dune in the fall too!

Dealing with notions of excess and such a labor-intensive practice, do you ever consider the sustainability of continuously producing?

Yes I certainly do. I largely use recycled materials, but I still also use purchased materials as well such as fabric or craft materials or construction supplies. I’m super grateful for places like Materials for the Arts which has an endless supply of free unconventional materials, ready to be recycled. The slow labor of my practice can be problematic because it takes me so long to finish things and I see my peers churning out new work. It also causes your pricing to be higher, which means it’s less likely to sell. Because of this, I’m glad that I am also able to create easily producible digital pieces in addition to the physical work. I’m starting to appreciate my slow process more, because I think there’s a tendency for emerging artists to feel pressured to produce new work all the time to stay relevant. We’re obsessed with newness. I’m starting to wonder about the sustainability of constantly producing and sending new objects out into a world already so filled with stuff. Guess I have a lot of time now to think about that…

Any final comments? (This is your electronic soapbox for one last answer.)

I hope everyone is staying safe and sane and getting some creative time in during this homebound period. I run an arts curatorial project in Brooklyn called Paradice Palase, and my partner and I have been working our buns over the last three works reviewing submissions for our open call show (that is now postponed), pushing shirt and artwork sales for our current show (which never got to have a physical opening), and doing a deep dive into re-branding, re-strategizing, and applying for grants and loans.

You can watch a virtual tour of our exhibition “Superimpose” over on Artfare’s youtube page and if you are looking for a cozy shirt to lounge in – we’ve got limited time only tees designed by our exhibiting artists for sale in our online shop! Our ethos as an arts platform is to make contemporary art more accessible to the public, and we just launched our Made In Paradice shirt brand for that purpose. As with most of us in the creative community, the artists who exhibit with us and support our projects are all hurting right now. Our shirt sales benefit both those artists and us as a women/artist owned business, so consider purchasing one if you can! They are made through a zero-waste dye sublimation process, have a longer, athletic fit, and are supppper soft. And they’re a collector’s item! All the wins. Give us a follow over at @paradicepalase or @_madeinparadice