VERONICA RYAN, “Infection VII (Punnet I),” 2020 (dyed thread doily, stacked cardboard mushroom boxes, stone casts, 5 7/8 x 19 3/4 x 19 3/4 inches / 15 x 50 x 50 cm). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE RA, Courtesy Paula Cooper Gallery, New York. Photo: Steven Probert
‘I’m really interested in contradiction and paradox and how that really speaks to our wider culture.’ — Veronica Ryan
THE FIRST COMPREHENSIVE museum survey of British artist Veronica Ryan (b. 1956) in the United States is being presented at a pair of museums in the Midwest. “Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects” recently opened at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation in Saint Louis, Mo., and will travel later this year to the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio. The exhibition presents more than four decades of work.
Born in Plymouth on the Caribbean island of Montserrat, Ryan grew up in the England. Since the 1990s, Ryan had divided her time between New York and the UK. In 2022, she won the prestigious Turner Prize. Over the course of her career, Ryan has developed a singular practice exploring personal narratives and global histories. Her work engages issues of displacement and memory, healing and belonging, and environmental concerns of consumption and waste.
“I’m really interested in contradiction and paradox and how that really speaks to our wider culture,” Ryan said a couple of years ago. “I tend to collect things wherever I am and that’s become part of how the work gets made as well, a bit like a magpie.”
Ryan works with bronze, marble, plaster, and wood, traditional materials reflecting her academic background, which includes studies at the Slade School of Fine Art in London. She also employs found and reused items, such as textile scraps, seeds and pods, food trays, pin cushions, bandages, and plastic bottles. She incorporates craft techniques learned from her mother, bringing intergenerational knowledge into her work through embroidery, needlepoint, and quilting. An early fellowship in Nigeria has also influenced her art-making methods over the years.
“Unruly Objects” offers a comprehensive examination of Ryan’s creative output spanning the late 1980s to 2020s, with more than 100 sculptures, textiles, and works on paper featured. CT
“Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects” is on view at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation in St. Louis, Mo. (March 7–July 27, 2025) and curated by Tamara H. Schenkenberg with Molly Moog. The exhibition will travel to the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio, where it runs from Aug. 22, 2025-Jan. 11, 2026
FIND MORE On April 17, 2025, Veronica Ryan will be in conversation with Courtney J. Martin at the Pulitzer Art Foundation in St. Louis. Martin is the executive director of the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation. Previously, she was director of the Yale Center for British Art
Artist Veronica Ryan. | Photo by Lisa Whiting Photography. © Veronica Ryan Courtesy Alison Jacques, London
Installation view of “Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects,” Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Mo. (March 7–July 27, 2025). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE, Photograph by Alise O’Brien Photography. © Pulitzer Arts Foundation and Alise O’Brien Photography
VERONICA RYAN, “Collective Moments III,” 2000/2022 (fabric, broad beans, thread, embroidery hoop, 18 1/2 x 11 x 1 5/8 inches / 47 x 28 x 4 cm). |© Veronica Ryan, OBE RA. Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, Courtesy Alison Jacques, London
Installation view of “Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects,” Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Mo. (March 7–July 27, 2025). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE, Photograph by Alise O’Brien Photography. © Pulitzer Arts Foundation and Alise O’Brien Photography
VERONICA RYAN, “Territories,” 1986 (oil and graphite on paper, 21 4/15 x 29 2/15 inches / 54.0 x 74.0 cm) [VR 1]. | © Veronica Ryan Courtesy of Paula Cooper Gallery. Photo: Kettle’s Yard
VERONICA RYAN, “Cluster,” 2021 (18 Bronze magnolia pods, fishing line, 43 5/16 x 6 11/16 x 3 1/8 inches / 110 x 17 x 8 cm). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE RA. Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through its Special Partnership with the Henry Moore Foundation, supported by Cathy Wills, 2022/23, Hepworth Wakefield, Wakefield, Courtesy Paula Cooper Gallery, New York
Installation view of “Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects,” Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Mo. (March 7–July 27, 2025). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE, Photograph by Alise O’Brien Photography. © Pulitzer Arts Foundation and Alise O’Brien Photography
Installation view of “Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects,” Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Mo. (March 7–July 27, 2025). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE, Photograph by Alise O’Brien Photography. © Pulitzer Arts Foundation and Alise O’Brien Photography
VERONICA RYAN, “Momento Mori I,” 2022 (bronze, reconfigured medical pillow, 5 7/8 x 11 3/4 x 15 3/4 inches / 15 x 30 x 40 cm). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE RA, Courtesy Alison Jacques, London
Installation view of “Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects,” Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Mo. (March 7–July 27, 2025). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE, Photograph by Alise O’Brien Photography. © Pulitzer Arts Foundation and Alise O’Brien Photography
Installation view of “Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects,” Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Mo. (March 7–July 27, 2025). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE, Photograph by Alise O’Brien Photography. © Pulitzer Arts Foundation and Alise O’Brien Photography
VERONICA RYAN, “Collective Moments V,” 2022 (plaster, hairnet and plastic bags, 4 x 3 1/2 x 6 1/4 inches / 10 x 9 x 16 cm). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE RA, Courtesy Alison Jacques, London
Installation view of “Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects,” Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Mo. (March 7–July 27, 2025). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE, Photograph by Alise O’Brien Photography. © Pulitzer Arts Foundation and Alise O’Brien Photography
VERONICA RYAN, “Disavowal (She Follows You Around),” 2002 (photographic print and acrylic on cardstock, 17 7/8 x 19 7/8 inches (45.4 x 50.5 cm). | © Veronica Ryan OBE RA, Courtesy Paula Cooper Gallery, New York. Photo: Steven Probert
Installation view of “Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects,” Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Mo. (March 7–July 27, 2025). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE, Photograph by Alise O’Brien Photography. © Pulitzer Arts Foundation and Alise O’Brien Photography
VERONICA RYAN, “Scaffold,” 2021-2022 (metal shelf, bronze, zip ties, empty coffee pods, sculpey, hydrocal, beads, self-hardening clay, bandages, thread, fishing line, plastic net, embroidery ring, 63 3/8 x 36 1/2 x 26 inches /161 x 92.7 x 66 cm). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE RA, Courtesy Paula Cooper Gallery, New York. Photo: Steven Probert
VERONICA RYAN, “Sweet Dreams are Made of These, 2021 (glazed ceramic stoneware, jute mat, 5 7/8 × 83 7/8 × 83 7/8 inches / 14.9 × 213 × 213 cm). Installed in Still Lives at The Hepworth Wakefied, March 2024–March 2025. | © Veronica Ryan, Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through its Special Partnership with the Henry Moore Foundation, supported by Cathy Wills, 2022/23. Wakefield Council Permanent Art Collection (The Hepworth Wakefield), Photo: George Baggaley
Installation view of “Veronica Ryan: Unruly Objects,” Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Mo. (March 7–July 27, 2025). | © Veronica Ryan, OBE, Photograph by Alise O’Brien Photography. © Pulitzer Arts Foundation and Alise O’Brien Photography
BOOKSHELF
“Veronica Ryan: Along a Spectrum” was published in 2021 to accompany the artist’s solo exhibition at Spike Island in Bristol, UK. Veronica Ryan is among the artist covered in “Black Artists in British Art: A History since the 1950s” by Eddie Chambers
