By Alex Greenberger

One’s eye typically skates right over the list of materials on the caption for an artwork, since the verbiage used—“oil on canvas,” “ink on paper,” and the like—tends to be more perfunctory than it is engaging. But in the case of Ruben Ulises Rodriguez Montoya’s sculptures of creatures in transformation, the words used to describe his many materials cannot be ignored because they are so stylized and so bizarre.

Take the case of The Lil Rat That Made It on Board the Ship (2021), a sculpture that appeared at Artists Space in New York this past summer. It’s an all-black assemblage that has a long, gnarled tail extending from its body and a pointy claw affixed to its head; it would not be out of place in the Alien universe. Its materials, as described by Montoya, are worth quoting at length: “My very very large black t-shirt that I smeared with pigmented dragon skin silicone. Welding wire, black zip ties, black and green sewing string, rabbit pelt, horn tips, half a horn, nail polish, dirty socks because Timoh was washing his calzones and I couldn’t wait, emerald powdered pigment, car fender, black car part, possed bouncing ball.”