The German-Swiss artist Dieter Roth, active from the 1960s through the 1990s, created large-scale installations and sculptures using cheese as a primary material, including his 'Mould Paintings' and 'Cheese Race.' Roth used cheese's natural decay to explore themes of consumerism, waste, and the passage of time, blurring the line between art and ephemeral process.

Roth's cheese-based art has inspired poets to explore similar themes of transience and decay, connecting the visual and verbal arts in their shared concern with materiality and time. His work has been the subject of ekphrastic poems that meditate on the smell, texture, and eventual decomposition of cheese, challenging poets to find beauty in the processes of aging and decay. Roth's legacy continues to influence contemporary art and poetry.