Work samples

  • Everyday Things: Restraint + Routine
    Everyday Things: Restraint + Routine
    Acrylic on canvas. 12w x 16h. 2020. [ Image Description: A colorful acrylic painting of pink fuzzy handcuffs, medication bottles, various types of makeup, trash, and a mirror. ]
  • Where You End and I Begin
    Where You End and I Begin
    Where You End and I Begin. Digital Photograph. 10'' x 13''. 2020. [ Image Description: a photograph of two disabled people intertwined. It is difficult to tell whose appendages belongs to who and where one person's body ends and where the others' begins. ]
  • Rock-a-bye to my health
    Rock-a-bye to my health
    Acrylic and blood on canvas. 16 x 20. 2021. [ Image description: a painting of a crib in a pink room. The crib has a stomach filled with prednisone pills in the intestines. Next to it is an old teddy bear with an eye falling out. Above the crib is a mobile of medical equipment including a blood transfusion bag, a butterfly needle and an IV. There are cobwebs everywhere. ]
  • Waiting by the Phone
    Waiting by the Phone
    Acrylic on canvas. 8 x 11. 2021. [ Image Description: a colorful painting of a pink fuzzy, feathered retro phone. In front of the phone are prednisone pills and a pill bottle. ]

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About Ruby

Baltimore County
Ruby is a non-binary, queer and disabled artist residing in the Towson area. They would consider themselves many fragments, all that mold into a fleshy sculpture: mad, kinky demi-sexual, survivor, poet, and someone who is living with Lupus, Fibromyalgia, ADHD, Anxiety, and Depression.


Their art challenges social issues surrounding disability, sex, and identity. Ruby works in multiple mediums depending on what fits the conceptual message best, including mixed-media paintings,… more
View Ruby's Resume
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Medical Trauma

Artist Statement:

After my second near death expereince due to my chronic illness, I created a series of paintings that reflect the expereince of medical gaslighting and trauma I expereienced. This is not new to disabled or chronically ill people, and the series addresses lonlieness, isolation, mortality, and the treatment of disabled folks in the medical community and at large. 
  • Rock-a-bye to my health
    Rock-a-bye to my health
    Acrylic and blood on canvas. 16 x 20. 2021. [ Image Description: a painting of crib in a pink room. Inside the crib there is a stomach filled with prednisone pills in the intestines, beside it is an old teddy bear with an eye falling out. Above the crib is a mobile with medical components hanging down, such as a transfusion bag, a butterfly needle and an IV. The crib is covered in cobwebs. ]
  • Waiting by the Phone
    Waiting by the Phone
    Acrylic on canvas. 8 x 11. 2021. [ Image Description: A painting of a pink fuzzy, feathery vintage phone. In front of the phone, there are pills of prednisone dispersed about and coming out of a medicine bottle. The background is bright blue and the foreground is a light purple. ]
  • Platelets
    Platelets
    Acrylic paint and blood on canvas. 20 x 16. 2021. [ Image Description: A still-life painting of cleaner wipes, a pipe and cannabis, orange gummy bears, as well as an open bag of froot loops. The froot loops are transforming into blood platelets and are painted with my own blood. Beside the platelets are prednisone pills. ]
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    • Human Objects: Reclaiming Objectification

    Artist Statement: 

    Boundaries blur and body parts morph into one another. I simply cannot be disconnected from my queerness and my body, my body and how I move across the plane, and yet I aspire to transmute my physical form. I am a gaseous ball of stardust having a human experience without a gender, and yet how gender is navigated remains a big part of my life. How I see myself and how the world sees me sometimes differs-- it all forms into a monstrosity of persepctives, opinions and diagnoses. 

    Am I real? Some people say that I do not exist. We are told to mask ourselves, and when we life the veil they point their fingers. To them, we are objects to be disregarded, touched, bought, mocked, to sit in a room like a chair, unnnoticed. Objects of sex and objects of asexuality. We reclaim the objectification of our transness, queerness and disabled bodies through sensual play. We reclaim our pain, our hurt, and morph it into pleasure. 
    • Where You End and I Begin
      Where You End and I Begin
      [ Image Description: A black and white photograph of two disabled bodies morphing into one another. It is difficult to tell where one person's appendages end, and where the others' begin. ]
    • Masking
      Masking
      [ Image Description: a black and white photograph of a disabled, autistic person who has their face completely covered in COVID-19 medical masks. ]
    • Stimming
      Stimming
      [ Image Description: a black and white photograph of an autistic person who is restrained by rope bondage. They are stimming. ]
    • Table
      Table
      Digital Photograph. 13'' x 10''. 2020. [ Image Description: a black and white photograph of a person on all fours. They are wearing a table cloth over their body and face, with a black BDSM collar over top the neck to define the head. On top of their back is a wine bottle with a candle in it, as well as a plate of fruits (banana and oranges.) The background is a draped sheet. ]
    • Cup
      Cup
      Digital Photograph. 13'' x 10''. 2020. [ Image Description: a black and white photograph of a close up of a disabled person's mouth and neck. The mouth has a spit bubble overtop it and there is three lines of spit drooling down the neck. ]
    • Reusable Straw
      Reusable Straw
      Digital Photograph. 10'' x 13''. 2020. [ Image Description: a black and white photograph of a close up of the bottom part of a disabled person's face with emphasis on the mouth. Inside their mouth is a reusable straw which they are holding with their teeth. There is spit dripping out of their mouth on to their chin and chest. ]
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    • Disability + BDSM

    Artist Statement:

    Conglomerates of needles + whips, ventilators + sex toys, blur the lines of where disability care ends and sex begins. Pieces of surreal body parts, unidentifiable skin fragments, appendages, and sensual images blend together the fluidity of sexuality, the changing, moving body and fluidity of gender. Bedroom colors and BDSM aesthetics reclaim this queer, trans, and disabled body’s sexual agency, autonomy and births pleasure from pain, whether masochism or finding joy and taking up space despite the social structures that does not want it to exist.
    • disability + bdsm
      disability + bdsm
      4 canvases, each 14 1/2’’h x 19 1/2’’w. Total dimensions: 30’’h x 40’’w. Acrylic on canvas. 2020. [ Image Description: 4 canvases, each split into 4 squares, have colorful backgrounds that are either red, pink, purple or blue. Each square has either a BDSM object such as a toy, garment, whip, etc and the diagonal square has a disability-related item such as needles, canes, or other aids. ]
    • Everyday Things: Restraint + Routine
      Everyday Things: Restraint + Routine
      Acrylic on canvas. 15 1/2’’h x 10 1/2’’ w. 2020. [ Image Description: This is a still life painting of different objects with vibrant pink, purple, green and orange colors. There are pink fuzzy handcuffs in the upper left corner, and spilled orange pill bottles with "Lexapro", "Pregablin" and "Strattera" written on them next to the handcuffs and in the bottom right corner. In the upper right corner there is a pink hand-held mirror, a green crumpled receipt, as well as open mascara and liquid eyeliner that are black. In the bottom left corner there is a crushed green pack of cigarettes, a colorful makeup palette, lipstick and a makeup brush. ]
    • Detail of Disability + BDSM
      Detail of Disability + BDSM
      Acrylic. 14 1/2 x 19 1/2 in. 2020. [ Image Description: A canvas is divided into four colorful squares, and in each are something that relates to sex, BDSM and/or disability. The first square is baby pink with a purple gagball. The second square has a dark blue background with light baby pink pet/kitten ears and a pink hearing aid. The third square is red with a lacy, maroon bra. The fourth square is a light purple background and a gray CPAP machine painted overtop. ]
    • Detail of Disability + BDSM
      Detail of Disability + BDSM
      Acrylic. 14 1/2 x 19 1/2 in. 2020. [ Image Description: The canvas is split into four sections, each with a different color and object relating to sex, BDSM and/or disability. The first square is a purple background with four EKG stickers and color cords (red, blue, green and yellow.) The second panel has a light blue background with gray and multicolored fidget toys, such as a fidget spinner and fidget cube. The third panel has a baby pink background with a purple vibrator and red sex dice. The fourth panel has a red background and pink bondage rope as well as silver nipple clamps. ]
    • Detail of Disability + BDSM
      Detail of Disability + BDSM
      Acrylic. 14 1/2 x 19 1/2 in. 2020. [ Image Description: The canvas is split into four colorful sections and each have an object that relates to sex, BDSM, and/or disability. The first panel is light blue with a butterfly needle and tubes of blood. The second panel has a red background and shows a close up of a blue cane with a black handle. The third panel is purple and has black whips and crops. The fourth panel is baby pink and depicts a purple butt plug and a glass, pink heart shaped dildo. ]
    • Detail of Disability + BDSM
      Detail of Disability + BDSM
      Acrylic. 14 1/2 x 19 1/2 in. 2020. [ Image Description: The canvas is split into four sections, each with an object that relates to sex, BDSM and / or disability. The first square has a dark blue background and a light blue and white COVID-19 / doctor's face mask. The second panel is baby pink with a fluffy fox tail butt plug. The third square is dark blue with an enema and two bottles of lube. The fourth square is dark red with a black, silky mask to cover the eyes. ]
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    • Concept Art

    • Overdose
      Overdose
      Assemblage of found objects including wood piece, pill bottles, flowers, and plastic beads. 2018. [ Image Description: Two pill bottles bursting with flowers sit glued upon a wooden triangle base. One pill bottle is upright and the other is tipped on its side with beads and flowers flowing out from it. ]
    • Campus Climate
      Campus Climate
      Assemblage. 2018. [ Image Description: A pink thong hangs on a white hanger. On the panty line drops over a condom that appears bloody. ]
    • Shaving my head
      Shaving my head
      Assemblage of hair and empty Yoohoo boxes. 2018. [Image Description: To the left a pile of brown hair is shaped into a fixed mound. There are circular patterns to how the hair was molded. To the right of the hair are two empty Yoohoo cartons. One stands upright and the other is on its' side and is also crushed. ]
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