#74: Tara Sellios on Making Art With Bones, Insects, and Powerful Symbolism

Tara Sellios is a Boston-based artist whose monumental photographs highlight the beauty of the grotesque. She creates still life vignettes from organic materials including animal bones, insect specimens, and dried flowers which she photographs using a large format 8 x 10 camera. Tara's imagery takes inspiration from Christian devotionals including illuminated manuscripts, altarpieces, and stained glass windows while engaging with historical traditions of still life painting, particularly Dutch vanitas paintings. Her series, Ask Now the Beasts, which is exhibiting at the Fitchburg Art Museum in Massachusetts until January 18, 2026, takes its name from the Book of Job and explores concepts of the harvest and the apocalypse. In this new work, Tara considers the cyclical nature of Earth, intertwining symbols of death and references to life with the beauty of decay.In this week's episode, we talk about it all — from the a-ha moment in art school when Tara first discovered her photographic direction, to the impact her strict religious upbringing had on her work. We also explore the ways in which she uses symbolism, the way she lights her photographs, and what it took to get her first solo exhibition up and running. Website: https://www.tarasellios.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/tarasellios/ FOR EXCLUSIVE CREATIVITY TIPS, MUSINGS, AND EXERCISES, SUBSCRIBE TO THE ALWAYS CHOOSE ORANGE NEWSLETTER: https://www.alwayschooseorange.com

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