Flowers in vanitas paintings are brilliantly colored, captured at the peak of their bloom and beauty. They’re meant to remind us of the exquisite natural phenomena we’ll leave behind in death. In his new paintings, Gerald Davis subverts this baroque tradition of vanitas, portraying roses, violets, and poppies in wilt and death. The drooping, drying petals lose nothing in resplendence but take on a more macabre resonance. Painted in exacting detail, the blooms' collapsing structures, dappled by light and shade, appear statuesque, and the amber, magenta, mauve, and sage shades feel at once voluptuous and refined. The works’ grand scale—all of the paintings are 79” by 55”—induces an Alice in Wonderland-style psychedelic trip, tilting the viewer into a world of life and death, decadence and decay.