{"id":288664,"date":"2025-12-09T18:39:46","date_gmt":"2025-12-09T09:39:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/?p=288664"},"modified":"2025-12-09T18:39:46","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T09:39:46","slug":"emotional-debris-kathleen-ryans-cosmology-displayed-in-souvenir-exhibition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/art\/emotional-debris-kathleen-ryans-cosmology-displayed-in-souvenir-exhibition\/","title":{"rendered":"EMOTIONAL DEBRIS: KATHLEEN RYAN\u2019S COSMOLOGY DISPLAYED IN SOUVENIR EXHIBITION"},"content":{"rendered":"

K<\/span>athleen Ryan\u2019s Souvenir<\/a> at Karma Los Angeles unfolds like a glittering emotional booby trap: a room full of oversized memories, sugary illusions, and objects swollen with psychological charge. The exhibition presents nine sculptures<\/strong>, each carrying the blurred sentiment of something once loved, once embarrassing, once precious, and now magnified until its emotional core becomes impossible to ignore. The press release makes it clear: these works deal in \u201clonging, shame, sweetness, and sentiment,\u201d letting symbolism mutate under the pressure of scale and contradiction.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-1\"<\/a>

Sunset Strip, 2025. Amethyst, rose quartz, agate, calcite, chalcedony, kyanite, celestite, stilbite, apophyllite, aquamarine,
\r\nrhodonite, sodalite, quartz, cherry quartz, glass, acrylic, aluminum and steel pins on coated polystyrene, 75\u00bd \u00d7 81 \u00d7 25 in.
\r\n(191.77 \u00d7 205.74 \u00d7 63.50 cm)<\/p><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n

Ryan\u2019s poetics hinge on material tension, softness turned rigid, sweetness decaying into grotesque bloom, sparkle masking a heavier truth. Souvenir intensifies that logic. Her sculptures don\u2019t illustrate emotions; they perform them, staging the emotional messiness that clings to everyday objects long after their practical lives end.<\/p>\r\n

The trio of cast-concrete peaches, Heartthrob, Heartbreaker,<\/strong> and Wild Heart<\/strong>, embody this duality with surgical clarity. Their skins appear tender and tactile, but each peach hides an automotive engine<\/strong> in place of its pit. The press release positions these works as meditations on beauty\u2019s collision with violence, vulnerability fused with machinery. The friction is immediate: desire meets metal, and softness becomes a shell for something relentlessly mechanical. The peaches aren\u2019t metaphors for the body, they\u2019re metaphors for how the body feels.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-2\"<\/a>

Wild Heart, 2025. Concrete, steel and Harley Davidson engine.<\/p><\/div>

\"adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-3\"<\/a>

Heartbreaker, 2025. Concrete, steel, and Ford Transit engine.
\r\nHeartthrob, 2025. Concrete, steel and Ford F-150 engine.<\/p><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n

The four monumental ring sculptures push Ryan\u2019s poetics into the terrain of adolescence. Built from soda-can aluminum, bowling balls, resin, steel, and glass, they swell costume-jewelry tropes into emotional monuments. The press materials explicitly link these oversized rings to teenage glamour, awkward desire, and the sentimental charge of decorative objects. Glitter becomes weight. Sparkle becomes memory sediment. The rings drag their cultural baggage behind them, romance, insecurity, melodrama, just as the press release phrases it: \u201csymbols dragging their prior contexts.\u201d<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-4\"<\/a>

Heavy Heart, 2025. Cast iron and glass.<\/p><\/div>

\"adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-5\"<\/a>

From the left: Starstruck, Heavy Heart (back), Show Pony, Sunset Strip, Sweet Nothings.
\r\n2025<\/p><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n

Then there is Dreamhouse (2025)<\/strong>, the gravitational center of the exhibition and the most theatrical expression of Ryan\u2019s material logic. A colossal raspberry encrusted with beads and gem-like growths, it blooms with mold-like textures on its surface. Inside, a crystalline cavern of pink and red forms creates a jewel-toned stalactite chamber. Dreamhouse turns sweetness into spectacle, rot into ornament. It doesn\u2019t resolve its contradictions, it revels in them.\"adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-7\"<\/a><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-8\"<\/a>

Dreamhouse, 2025. Malachite, azurite, lapis lazuli, amazonite, aventurine, turquoise,
\r\nchrysocolla, magnesite, howlite, amethyst, garnet, serpentine, quartz, chalcedony and
\r\nquartz stalactite, fluorite, coral chalcedony, zeolite, larimar, sodalite, calcite, acrylic, steel,
\r\naquaresin, stainless-steel nails, and steel pins on coated polystyrene, 83 1\u20442 \u00d7 83 1\u20442 \u00d7
\r\n86 1\u20442 in. (212.1 \u00d7 212.1 \u00d7 219.7 cm)<\/p><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n

The exhibition also introduces two sculptures that sharpen the emotional palette of Souvenir: Sunset Strip\u2019s<\/strong> and Starstruck<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\r\n

Both works appear in the press release as part of the exhibition\u2019s constellation, extending yan\u2019s vocabulary of hybrid forms and shifting symbols. While the gallery does not expand on their individual narratives, their placement within Souvenir echoes the show\u2019s thematic spine: the pull between glamour and decay, fantasy and heaviness, the curated shine of memory and the raw material that supports it. Their titles alone, Sunset Strip\u2019s and Starstruck, invoke Los Angeles mythologies of fame, seduction, and selfperformance, fitting seamlessly into Ryan\u2019s ongoing interrogation of how cultural icons accumulate emotional residue.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-9\"<\/a>

Starstruck, 2025. Agate, tektite, obsidian, amethyst, amber, pyrite, hematite, lapis lazuli, lava rock, black
\r\nkyanite, smoky quartz, garnet, carnelian, jasper, tiger eye, wood, glass, acrylic, aluminum and steel pins on
\r\ncoated polystyrene, 77 \u00d7 80 \u00d7 20\u00bd in. (195.58 \u00d7 203.20 \u00d7 52.07 cm<\/p><\/div>

\"adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-11\"<\/a>

Show Pony, 2025. Aluminum, powder coating, and glass.
\r\nSunset Strip, 2025<\/p><\/div>

\"adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-10\"<\/a>

Starstruck, 2025.
\r\nShow Pony, 2025.<\/p><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n

Taken together, the nine works act as a map of Ryan\u2019s poetics. The press release outlines her interest in the \u201cemotional life of objects,\u201d and Souvenir delivers that idea with physical force. Fruit becomes engine; rings become architecture; berries become caverns. Everyday motifs swell into psychological landscapes, negotiating desire, shame, and the strange intimacy of symbols we inherit without choosing.<\/p>\r\n

Born in 1984 in Santa Monica and now working in Los Angeles, Ryan uses materials, concrete, resin, metals, soda cans, plastic beads, stones, the way a poet uses language. Not descriptively, but structurally. She lets material contradictions expose emotional ones. \u201cSoft things made hard,\u201d \u201csweet things made grotesque\u201d, these press-release phrases aren\u2019t stylistic flourishes; they\u2019re the blueprint of her practice.<\/p>\r\n

A souvenir is usually small, something you slip into a pocket. Ryan overturns that expectation. Her souvenirs are oversized, excessive, heavy with meaning. They refuse portability. They insist on being carried psychologically rather than physically. They are reminders of states of mind, not places on a map.<\/p>\r\n

In Souvenir<\/em>, Kathleen Ryan builds a world where sweetness bruises, glamour sours, and sentiment grows geological. You enter for the shimmer; you stay for the tension. Her objects don\u2019t simply look back at you, they remember you.<\/p>\r\n

Kathleen Ryan \"Souvenir\"<\/span><\/h3><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Date<\/td>\r\nNovember 8\u2013December 20, 2025<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n
Opening reception<\/td>\r\nSaturday, November 8, 6\u20138 pm<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n
Venue<\/td>\r\nKarma 7351 Santa Monica Boulevard Los Angeles<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n
URL<\/td>\r\nhttps:\/\/tinyurl.com\/s76uzmyw<\/a><\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<\/tbody>\r\n<\/table><\/article>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

athleen Ryan\u2019s Souvenir at Karma Los Angeles unfolds like a glittering emotional booby trap: a room full of ov […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":288658,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"EMOTIONAL DEBRIS: KATHLEEN RYAN\u2019S COSMOLOGY DISPLAYED IN SOUVENIR EXHIBITION #adf #npoadf #art #artgallery #exhibition #la","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[6],"tags":[54,55,121,446,488],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/adf-web-magazine-emo-tional-debris-1.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288664"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288664"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288664\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288658"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.adfwebmagazine.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}