Kimberly Witham is a professional photographer with a green thumb, a certificate in taxidermy, and a background in art history. She manages to combine all three in a series of photographs called On Ripeness and Rot.

See a slideshow below.

Witham pays homage to the Dutch still-life paintings. Artists like Pieter Claeszand Abraham van Beyerenweren’t just doing a pretty bowl of fruit and a pitcher of water. Their still lifes were allegorical, representing flower, fruit, and fauna in varying stages of ripeness and decay. Witham explains, “These paintings serve as both a celebration of beauty and a reminder of the inevitability of death. They are simultaneously seductive and grotesque.” Like the old masters she emulates, her photographs are at once breathtaking and disturbing.

But these still-lifes are all-American. All-New Jerseyan, specifically. Witham gets her fruits, flowers, and vegetables from her own garden. The animals are all sourced from the sides of local roads. Witham’s father-in-law gave her a collection kit (gloves, ropes, disinfectant, pliers) that she keeps in a nylon bag in the trunk of her Honda.

You can see more of Kimberly Witham’s work here.