Note: Contains images that may be considered graphic and disturbing to some readers.

Patricia Piccinini is an Australia-based multimedia artist known for her large sculptures of fleshy hybrids that trouble the categories of human and animal, natural and unnatural. In the past year, she has created some astounding sculptures of alien-like flowers, titled “Bootflower,” “Metaflora (Stone Mountain),” and “Metaflora (Twin Rivers Mouth),” shown respectively below. The “flowers,” made out of silicone, fibreglass, and human hair, seem to move with sentient life, with gaping mouths, twisting necks, and hairy manes. Interested in science and the concerns surrounding bioengineering, Piccinini’s beautifully grotesque “plants” challenge us with questions of identity and the manipulation of life.

The last three images shown below are older but seminal works. The sculpture “The Long Awaited” (2008) was featured in Illusion’s “10 Nude Sculptures that Caused a Stir.”

Images © Patricia Piccinini