I’m thrilled to be sharing this conversation with Brooklyn-based artist, curator, photographer, and PARADICE PALASE co-founder Kat Ryals. Her practice is often influenced by her upbringing in Arkansas and the Acadiana region of Louisiana, where her days were spent rummaging through thrift and junk stores, daydreaming in ornate Catholic churches, and roaming unspoiled forests and swamps.
She describes her interdisciplinary approach as one where a form of recycling or reproduction occurs through techniques associated with photography, printmaking, craft-based assemblage, and molding and casting. She’s interested in perceptions of authenticity, taste, and hierarchy, examining how cultural currencies shape personal desires and reinforce systems of social and environmental disparities.
Kat received a BFA in Photography from Savannah College of Art and Design and an MFA & Adv. Certificate in Museum Education from Brooklyn College. She has shown her work nationally, including in solo booths at SPRING/BREAK Art Show in 2020 and 2022, a collaborative two-person show at Elijah Wheat Showroom in 2023, a two-person show at Ortega Y Gasset Projects in 2022, and in recent group exhibitions with ChaShaMa, Ortega Y Gasset Projects, and The Wassaic Project. She’s currently working on a solo exhibition with 5-50 Gallery, scheduled to open September of this year.
It was lovely to speak with Kat about her studio practice, curating, the birth of and vision for PARADISE PALACE alongside our last Q+A guest Lauren Hirshfield, and some valuable lessons she’s learned along the way.
See you again at the usual time this week.
—Kate
Q+A: Kat Ryals
I read that you grew up in Arkansas, which I immediately related to in the sense that I also grew up in a place not necessarily known as a hub of contemporary art. How did you find your way to the art world?
I grew up being kinda one of those “art” kids. I obsessively loved drawing, won art contests at school, etc. When I got to high school I was unsurprisingly most interested in art class, and I knew that I wanted to go into creative arts. However, I went to a small, all-girls Catholic high school, so our aren’t program wasn’t big (I think my senior art class was like 6 people) and it wasn’t highly encouraged at the school. At one point, they wouldn’t let me take theater, home-ec, and art class at the same time because it was too many art classes for them. My friend actually got her painting censored from our senior show because it depicted just the backside of a woman—I don’t even think there was crack!
While I was in high school, we had an alumni who was at SCAD come visit our class, and after learning of SCAD I ended up applying for college there. I was just like oh, okay, SOLD! (I didn’t know any other art schools at the time.) My parents were generally supportive of me going to art school. My dad was an art major when he first got to college in Louisiana, but realized that wasn’t a viable career choice for him and switched majors. So I think there’s always been this hope that I could pull it off.
Surprisingly, Arkansas has become a bit of a hub for art now (thanks Walmart?). Places like Crystal Bridges and the Momentary are located there now, which is wonderful. But that experience of being in a place where art was not really valued has always affected me.
It’s part of why when we started our artist network with PARADICE PALASE, we wanted the programs, community, and artwork to be accessible to artists and patrons anywhere in the U.S., because I don’t think you should have to live in New York to be part of the contemporary art scene. So, online access has always been an important component to us. One day we hope to be more physically active in other states as well!
Can you tell me a bit about your work as an artist?
I had originally wanted to be a fashion photographer when I got to college. Eventually, I realized I wanted to stay outside of the commercial art realm. I started out my career still working in photography, mostly portraiture, and was most interested in film and alternative processes. I transitioned into more of a mixed-media artist a few years after school, when I was building costumes, props, and sets and photographing models with them. At that point, I realized I wanted to physically make things again and found my way back into other processes and mediums, so it was an ideal time to then head off to grad school.
While I was in grad school, I started building installations and sculptures that I would then photograph and translate into prints, with the original objects also standing alone as works themselves. And that set me on my current path. My current practice is a mix of sculpture, lens-based work, textile art, and site-specific installations, where I often emulate material culture and organic artifacts. I’m most drawn to replicating objects that symbolize high status—like rugs, chandeliers, garments, and houseplants—subverting embedded notions of value and waste by incorporating cheap, found, and recycled materials.
Growing up Catholic in the South impacted me a bit more than I think I realized. In grad school, I was drawn to exploring consumerism, spirituality, and ideas about a sort of post apocalyptic future. I was raised in suburban Arkansas and the rural Cajun Acadiana region of Louisiana where my grandparents had a farm. I spent a lot of time rummaging through thrift stores, daydreaming in ornate churches, and wandering forests, swamps, and gardens. My aunt was a public high school teacher in Louisiana and I used to latch on to these summer educational Europe trips she would take her students on, so I also got to experience Baroque palaces and medieval castles and such during those teen years, too. So I think these experiences continue to inform my fascination with the aesthetics of excess, ornamentation, and decay.
When did you begin curating? Do you feel like this is interwoven with your artistic practice these days?
I started curating when we founded PARADICE PALASE in 2017. And yes, I do actually! I never thought I’d want to curate, but I love it so much. While at Brooklyn College, I stayed on an extra year in 2016 to do a Museum Education Certificate, and one of our finals was curating a fake museum show. I enjoyed the research and conversation-building between pairing artists so much that shortly thereafter, I started PARADICE PALASE as a curatorial project with Lauren Hirshfield.
I see curating as an extension of my artist practice, especially when curating around themes in order to world build or working on an immersive installation or site specific space with other artists. I like to think of the gallery as a canvas—as corny as that sounds, I know—to think about how to creatively display work and bring the work and a space to life.
But I think it also comes naturally to me, maybe, as someone who aggregates materials to build their art work. My rugs, in a way, just become another form of curating—finding and selecting specific objects and textiles to put together as a larger whole.
I also think it’s about having the “eye,” as they say—knowing that my position as an artist means I can identify exciting work and amplify it for other people to get excited about it, too. I also really just want to support and champion other artists as much as possible. Maybe nobody’s going to come beat down my door to give me a show, but we can work with and support each other. We could be the gateways to the next steps in our careers, so that’s important. But it also just makes our work so much more fulfilling when we collaborate with and work with one another.
I'd love to know what the impetus was for PARADICE PALASE that you co-founded with Lauren Hirshfeld—what motivated you to start this platform?
Hating the structure of the art world lol. Our driving force was pushing back against tired modes of operation and wondering if we could try something else that may work better for more people. There’s the high-end commercial gallery side of things, highly exclusive and inaccessible, then the non-profit world—exhausting and precarious. Both very limiting. And then there’s of course the scrappy artist-run and community operations, that are near-and-dear to our hearts, but these are labors of love. Are there models that could be easier for both artists and patrons to access and for organizations to sustain?
With that in mind, our first iteration was focused on garnering support for emerging artists not from grants or foundations or collectors, but the community at large. How can we encourage more interest and engagement in contemporary art, and how can we make it accessible financially? We came up with curating group exhibitions anchored around a crowdfunding campaign, where artists would provide small works and merch—prints, tee shirts, small works, etc.—as rewards in the campaigns. When someone contributed to the campaign, they could select a reward to “collect” dependent on their support tier.
This allowed us to create a fund for each of these early exhibitions and split it with the artists to create stipends. The thought was that it could help create emerging collectors, who now have this cool item from an artist, and maybe they’ll collect something else from them later on as they follow their career. It also allowed the public to have a role in the production of the exhibition. Going to a gallery is generally a passive experience, but this was a way for people to have stake in it even if they couldn’t afford a $5,000 painting.
Since we launched this right out of the gate, it wasn’t sustainable at our beginning stage. This evolved into mimicking museum membership programs, because why couldn’t a gallery do that? We launched the first iteration of our membership and starting doing more public workshops and programs, usually outside of our space so we could meet more folks just out in NYC who clearly were art curious.
With the rise of the pandemic, our membership shifted more to an artist support network that offered guidance on navigating our notoriously opaque industry while building a community for artists. We’ve largely been here for a while, and we also work with our artists on various partnerships, exhibitions, and projects in-person as they come along.
What does PARADICE PALASE offer for or do in collaboration with artists? What continues to energize you about the program?
We’re a community-driven network and digital platform that facilitates the career advancement of emerging and under-represented artists. We connect our artists to their peers, to industry professionals, to art business resources, and to external opportunities across the U.S. and beyond. We also curate and organize partner presentations with galleries, art fairs, universities, and more. In the past we’ve worked with NADA, Future Fair, The Other Art Fair, Uprise Art, SaveArtSpace, SVA, and House of Yes. And in 2024, we launched a Residency Fellowship in partnership with ChaNorth, annually awarding one month-long residency with financial support in the quiet woods of the Hudson Valley, NY.
Our membership largely consists of a digital forum, peer activities like studio visit swaps, crits and feedback sessions, and online programming with industry professionals, ranging from mentorship sessions to topic-based lectures and discussions. We send our artists open calls and other opportunities and champion their work through our online presence. In the past, we had a brick-and-mortar space where we worked with them on exhibitions, but now we work with them on pop-ups and partner projects like those mentioned above.
What continues to energize me is, firstly, all the incredible artists that I meet and befriend through the network—we have so many amazing artists, it’s truly humbling. The second thing is when we find out we helped an artist get an opportunity, whether it’s a show, gallery representation, or a residency, etc.. I actually think that’s my dopamine hit lol—finding out we facilitated an opportunity for someone.
I am continually motivated and inspired by the strength of an artist community. Despite how much time and work it all is, it has definitely been what’s gotten me through the hard times—being amongst folks who care and want to be part of something and who are enthusiastic about collaborating, sharing, and exchanging.
While I was doing an arts research residency at the Studios of Key West in February, I came across an aha! moment of where I’d like to see PARADICE PALASE evolve. It will take years to work out, but I’d love to see the activities we first started with merge with our artist network. I’d love to work more cooperatively with our artists to plan, produce, and fund our programs and projects, and launch a patron membership that would engage with and support the work of the artists within our community. Sort of like a Patreon type of thing, but more boutique and collective-minded instead of being a tech platform for individual patronage.
PARADICE PALASE is just but one small bit of proof that there are many bold, talented artists out there working, and it’s baffling that there’s just not enough patronage to go around. At the end of the day, I just want artists to have viable careers and get paid for their work and be able to afford normal life things. But if it’s all hinged on sales of luxury goods, that’s not going to happen. So right now, I’m really just trying to think about how to bring more folks in as “patrons” and how people could access an artist’s work that may not be an outright sale. And we’ve got some exciting ideas brewing!
Is there something you run up against a lot in your curatorial or organizational work that as an artist you feel like you have a unique perspective on?
I think people are often interested in what its like wearing multiple hats. It’s tough to balance everything, and I don’t really have much insight for that because it’s a constant learning experience. But I think being on the other side as an admin and a curator, I can understand what makes someone easy to work with on the artist side and vice versa. So, I try to be considerate and think about, how can I make things easier for this artist that I’m working with? Or how do I make things easier for this gallery I’m working with? It’s not some big insider tip, but just ensuring prompt communication as much as possible and staying organized is a huge help both ways. Artists have a lot going on in their lives, as do curators and arts admin, so being respectful and considerate of that as much as possible is always good and helps you to build strong relationships.
What do you think is the most valuable tool or resource that younger or emerging artists today should know about? Is there a question you get all the time or wish there was something all artists knew before getting involved in projects?
Be cautious of what kind of things are being whispered in your ear at school. Pour the Kool-aid out? Art school is this fabulous place but also a fantasyland of sorts, where you get to make work full-time and live/breathe art. Which is amazing, but often during that process, they aren’t really helpful with teaching students how to develop the practical aspects of their career. What expectations do you have for your practice after you leave school? If you can’t achieve your goals immediately, what are the steps you need to take in order to get there? How are you going to make and support your work after school? Do you have a plan in place to guide you?
I’d say the best way to figure that out is through networking and relationship-building (which is why being part of an artist community—whether its PP or a small crit group you’re organizing—is so important!). You won’t get anywhere alone in your studio. Once you’ve identified a goal, you can work with each other to make it happen. If you’re not getting shows, work collaboratively with your friends to organize a show—do it in someone’s apartment! You need your community to ask questions to, get feedback from, resource share with, and support each other.
Another thing that I find super helpful is goal-setting. If something you want or need is not available to you right now, work out how you could get to it and what it will take (time, resources, savings?) to get there. Re-evaluate your goals every year. I like to keep a one-year goal list and a larger five-year list. It’s grounding, it helps clarify things for you, and eases panic. It helps you to accept that everything takes time and doesn’t happen over night as well.
Don’t be afraid to slow down and take care of yourself when you need to. The art world isn’t going anywhere, and nobody else is going to start making your work—only you can uniquely make the work that you do. Remember to enjoy living your life and don’t let the pressure consume you.
What are you working on now? Are you involved with any exciting projects coming up?
We just finished organizing two PARADICE PALASE shows in April/May that were collaboratively produced by 22 of our artists at Gloria’s Project Space (5 Eldridge Street) in Chinatown. Our first show, Dream Junk & Cosmic Dust, was up through May 4, and the second show, Phantom Body, continues through June 1. They’re our first in-person shows at a gallery in a few years!
Now we’re working on organizing an outdoor sculpture show with a group of our artists at ChaNorth (Pine Plains, NY) for the summer and Upstate Art Weekend. And other than that, it’s really just working on researching and developing our new path forward with PARADICE PALASE. I’m looking forward to diving into that more this summer.
In my studio, I have a solo show coming up at 5-50 Gallery (my first solo show at 37!) in September, and I will also have a two-person show in October with the City of Las Vegas.
Check out more at katryals.com, on Instagram, and at paradicepalase.com!
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