Having grown up on the island of Hawaii, Chris Ritson is all too aware of society’s struggle with sustainability. He sees how his geographically isolated community has struggled to manage natural resources, and how the results have effected the social and economic welfare of the islands. It’s observations like these that inspire him to examine society’s strained relationship with nature. He translates his findings into new methodologies of material and artistic production, because he believes humankind is capable of integrating positively with natural systems. Art, in his eyes, is very much a process and not just an end product, and it must account for all the aspects leading to the manifestation of the artwork.

For his work for the Talent Pressure Cooker of 2018, named Mushroom Painting – Pycnoporus cinnabarinus, Chris Ritson took sawdust from invasive trees cleared in Hawaiian reforestation projects and inoculated it with mycelia from a local strain of fungi. The mushroom fruits are then allowed to form on the surface, independently defining the composition as a response to their environment. The final works are dehydrated, and submerged in a molten encaustic medium (beeswax and damar tree sap) within a vacuum chamber.