Xiaojing Yan is an artist who "cultivates and collaborates with mushrooms" to make breathtaking sculptures. She starts with a base for the sculpture, and then sets it up to grow mushrooms all over the surface. She steps back and lets the mushrooms finish the artwork.
Yan uses Lingzhi mushrooms in her work. I love that these works are all filled with an element of surprise, because there's no way to control exactly how the mushrooms will look or grow with the sculpture. Lingzhi says she "lets the nature take over" in these works and that she "lets the sculpture sculpt itself.
In the video, we get to see a timelapse of the work developing as the mushrooms grow. This blend of art, nature, and science is so cool to watch. The sculpture is compelling at every phase. The end result is a sculpture of a woman with mushroom-growths coming off her face and abdomen, in a way that makes it look like the texture of her skin. I wish I could walk through a whole garden of these mushroom sculptures.
See also: Mushrooms better at playing keyboard than famed cat
