Mark Gallo

The everyday object fascinates me as a presence that may fall into an abyss of thoughts that wander through my mind at any given moment. Creating something that may subtlety grab at attention, like pulling a loose string on a sweater and at other times, demand it with force and urgency. I question whether this is about objects or rather a practice of how ideas are formulated and a deeper look into what this reveals before a thought reaches clay.

Being in quarantine has allowed my mind to wander with unusual pressures and obligations from normal life. Without access to clay I’ve started thinking in different ways and in turn, access a different way of working. Making in a way outside of convention is an inquiry of my notions about what an object is. Rather than focusing on an object, I focus on my wandering thoughts making the adjudication.

Taking a bite of an unknown fruit and squeezing the juice from it, layers of the earth and its crust sliced away or even form a small planet of its own with the most foreign growths, static noise and action by reaction, crisp mountain mornings and old cartoons.

I’m constantly pulling and referencing so much from my past in my work whether it’s a direct representation or a more general interpretation. This is where my research takes hold, trying to distinguish where these ideas are started and by working in that headspace translate it over to clay. To achieve the fluidity and freedom from my drawings and painting.