Still Life and Death at Harvard
Dasyatis guttata (1865, Brazil) – 20 x 16"
Sylvilagus bachmani exiguus (1904, Mexico) – 24 x 24"
Egretta garzetta (1878, Hungary) – 36 x 24"
Pseudemys nelsoni (1920, Florida) – 20 x 20"
Symphysodon discus (1840, Brazil) – 12 x 12"
Hyla miyatai (1988, Ecuador) – 16 x 12"
Petromyzon marinus (1998, Shawsheen River, MA) – 11 x 14"
Natural history museums present careful order: drawers, labels, glass cases. Yet behind that order lies accumulation. Harvard University’s archive alone holds more than 21 million animal specimens, most stored out of public view.
In my MFA thesis series, Still Life and Death at Harvard, I turned to these preserved bodies not to illustrate science, but to consider what their collection reveals about us. The tags tied to limbs and wings speak to our impulse to name, classify, and possess. The preserved forms themselves prompt reflection on mortality and on what remains after life has passed.
Through paint, the work creates space for mourning and acknowledgment — for confronting both the beauty and the unease embedded in preservation.