https://www.cincinnatimagazine.com/article/art-gave-erika-nj-allen-a-new-language/

Something about the rot is interesting,” an Art Academy instructor says during a senior critique session at the private art and design college in Over-the-Rhine. Students are presenting the progress of their senior thesis shows, which will be unveiled a few months down the road, and it’s Erika Nj Allen’s turn. A small podium displays a yellow and brown ceramic pineapple, its spiky crown—from actual fruit—decaying inside the clay vessel. Beside it are a green and yellow clay avocado with a real shriveling pit in the middle and a fabricated carrot with natural browning leaves protruding. Framed still life images littering the floor and pinned to the wall feature a fistful of real beets, a cabbage, and a cluster of grapes.