The title of this ongoing series of walking works is borrowed from a footnote in Rebecca Solnit’s ‘Wanderlust’, where Gary Snider describes bushwalking as ‘an irregular dancing - always shifting - step of walk on slabs and scree’. For Gallo, the irregular dancing of her walking is at once the navigation on foot of urban, suburban and industrial areas (often designed for vehicular traffic, and hostile to pedestrians), and the awkward dance of the intermittent bend-down to retrieve objects from the roadside.
Gallo’s work is a kind of archaeology of the present: an examination of the materiality and cycles of use of everyday objects. She collects fragments that appear to have reached obsolescence, and slips them back into circulation within a new, aesthetic value system. Her mobiles are a weighing-up of these objects, both literally and metaphorically: a proposition of equivalences between discarded and forgotten things.
Rebecca Gallo, An irregular dancing (Campbelltown) (detail), 2018, objects found on a walk starting and finishing at Campbelltown Arts Centre, steel, linen thread, steel wire, sinkers and swivels, approx. 250 x 250 x 150 cm. Installation view for Fisher’s Ghost Art Award 2018 at Campbelltown Arts Centre.
Rebecca Gallo, An irregular dancing (Campbelltown), 2018, objects found on a walk starting and finishing at Campbelltown Arts Centre, steel, linen thread, steel wire, sinkers and swivels, approx. 250 x 250 x 150 cm. Installation view for Fisher’s Ghost Art Award 2018 at Campbelltown Arts Centre.
Rebecca Gallo, An irregular dancing (Campbelltown), 2018, objects found on a walk starting and finishing at Campbelltown Arts Centre, steel, linen thread, steel wire, sinkers and swivels, approx. 250 x 250 x 150 cm. Installation view for Fisher’s Ghost Art Award 2018 at Campbelltown Arts Centre.
Rebecca Gallo, An irregular dancing (Campbelltown) (detail), 2018, objects found on a walk starting and finishing at Campbelltown Arts Centre, steel, linen thread, steel wire, sinkers and swivels, approx. 250 x 250 x 150 cm. Installation view for Fisher’s Ghost Art Award 2018 at Campbelltown Arts Centre.
Rebecca Gallo, An irregular dancing (Campbelltown) (detail), 2018, objects found on a walk starting and finishing at Campbelltown Arts Centre, steel, linen thread, steel wire, sinkers and swivels, approx. 250 x 250 x 150 cm. Installation view for Fisher’s Ghost Art Award 2018 at Campbelltown Arts Centre.
Rebecca Gallo, An irregular dancing (Campbelltown) (detail), 2018, objects found on a walk starting and finishing at Campbelltown Arts Centre, steel, linen thread, steel wire, sinkers and swivels, approx. 250 x 250 x 150 cm. Installation view for Fisher’s Ghost Art Award 2018 at Campbelltown Arts Centre.
Limber and Way Down were exhibited in the Churchie National Emerging Art Award finalists’ exhibition at QUT Art Museum in September 2018. Documentation by Carl Warner and Rebecca Gallo.
Rebecca Gallo, Way Down (left) and Limber (centre), installation view, Churchie National Emerging Art Award, QUT Art Museum, Brisbane, 2018. Photo: Carl Warner.
Rebecca Gallo, Way Down and Limber, gif with photographs by Carl Warner.
Rebecca Gallo, Limber (detail), 2018. Installation view, Churchie National Emerging Art Award, QUT Art Museum, Brisbane, 2018. Photo: Carl Warner.
Rebecca Gallo, Limber (detail), 2018. Installation view, Churchie National Emerging Art Award, QUT Art Museum, Brisbane, 2018. Photo: Carl Warner.
Rebecca Gallo, Limber (detail), 2018, mild steel, fishing wire, steel wire, ratchet strap, offcuts from Parramatta Artists Studios residents, 230 x 240 x 240 cm. Installation view, Churchie National Emerging Art Award, QUT Art Museum, Brisbane, 2018. Photo: Carl Warner.
Rebecca Gallo, Way Down, 2018, mild steel, lead weights, packaged clay, fishing wire, steel wire, 150 x 120 x 20 cm. Installation view, Churchie National Emerging Art Award, QUT Art Museum, Brisbane, 2018. Photo: Rebecca Gallo.
Small wins is an ongoing series of sculptures that combine deconstructed trophies with found and cast objects. Stripped of the engraving that announces an achievement, trophies lose their original value and purpose. Once-useful, discarded objects tell stories of the hands that held and used them and more general stories of consumption and decay. Small wins combines denuded trophies and found objects in celebration of minor, anonymous achievements; the stuff we overlook, forget or underrate.
Small wins 5-8 were exhibited at Sydney Contemporary Art Fair, Carriageworks in September 2018 with the National Art School stand.
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 5-8, 2018. Exhibited at Sydney Contemporary 2018.
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 5, 2018, granite trophy base and centre block, redacted engraving, concrete fragment, cast bronze, 10 x 18 x 10 cm
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 6, 2018, granite trophy base and centre block, redacted engraving, granite fragment, cast bronze, 12 x 20 x 10 cm
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 7, 2018, granite trophy base and centre block, redacted engraving, timber, found metal, 30 x 33 x 8 cm
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 8, 2018, granite trophy base and centre block, redacted engraving, found metal, 8 x 20 x 8 cm
From Here to There: Australian art and walking curated by Jane Denison and Sharne Wolff at Lismore Regional Gallery, July-August 2018. Featuring Nell, Lauren Brincat, Dean Brown, Daniel Crooks, Nici Cumpston, Rebecca Gallo, Agatha Gothe-Snape, Alex Karaconji, Noel McKenna, Sarah Mosca, Liam O’Brien and Sarah Rodigari. This work was made during a residency at the Binns Artist Studio, Lismore Regional Gallery. A catalogue was published to accompany the exhibition, featuring essays by Vanessa Berry and Andrew Frost.
More information:
Lismore Regional Gallery
Museums & Galleries NSW
Byron Arts Magazine
Vanessa Berry
Rebecca Gallo, An irregular dancing (Lismore), 2018, objects found on two walks in Lismore, stainless steel, fishing line, steel wire. Installation view at Lismore Regional Gallery, 2018.
Rebecca Gallo, An irregular dancing (Lismore), gif with photos by Carl Warner
Rebecca Gallo, Walking Lismore, artist flip book, 80pp digital printing, 6 x 12 cm, edition of 30
A solo presentation at Parramatta Artists Studios, May 2018.
For two weeks in the lead up to Movers and Makers 2018, Rebecca Gallo shifted her practice from the studio into the gallery, constructing new suspended sculptures from offcuts and cast-offs requested from the other PAS 2018 artists. In Balancing out, residues of the diverse material practices of each studio artist are folded into Gallo’s own work – a reflection on the complex flow of influences between artists who work in close proximity.
Photos by Document Photography.
Rebecca Gallo, Balancing Out, 2018, installation view at Parramatta Artists Studios. Photos by Document Photography.
A group exhibition at Casula Powerhouse, October 2017, curated by Brittany D’Chong. Cover image by Cara Lopez.
Rebecca Gallo, One Walk Sculptures (Parramatta), 2017. Installation view at Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre. This image: photography by Cara Lopez.
A group exhibition curated by Chloé Wolifson at Darren Knight Gallery, January - February 2017. Featuring Connie Anthes, Rebecca Gallo, Eloïse Kirk, Michelle Nikou, Lisa Sammut, Lotte Schwerdtfeger, Yasmin Smith, & Louise Weaver.
Cover image: photography by Simon Hewson
Rebecca Gallo, Support System, Installation view at Darren Knight Gallery, 2017. Photo by Simon Hewson.
Rebecca Gallo, Support System, Installation view at Darren Knight Gallery, 2017. Photo by Simon Hewson.
Rebecca Gallo, Arm’s Length, Installation view at Darren Knight Gallery, 2017. Photo by Simon Hewson.
Rebecca Gallo, Support System (detail), Installation view at Darren Knight Gallery, 2017.
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 3, 2017, wood, pigment, found metal, trophy base. Photo by Document Photography.
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 2, 2017, cast concrete and pigment, cast bronze, trophy base. Photo by Document Photography.
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 2 (detail), 2017. Photo by Document Photography.
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 4, 2017, cast bronze, found metal, trophy bases. Photo by Document Photography.
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 4 (detail), 2017. Photo by Document Photography.
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 1, 2017, cast concrete and pigment, found metal, stone, trophy base. Photo by Document Photography.
Rebecca Gallo, Floatation device, 2017, cast concrete, cast bronze, found metal, brass bolt. Photo by Document Photography.
Rebecca Gallo, Small wins 1-3, 2017. Photo by Document Photography.
A series of found object assemblages, each comprising objects collected during a single walk departing from and returning to home. Exhibited in Written In Time curated by Catherine Benz at Delmar Gallery, Ashfield, January-February 2016.
Cover image: photography by Silversalt
Rebecca Gallo, One Walk Sculptures, objects collected on walks leaving from and returning to home in Erskineville, Sydney. Installation view at Delmar Gallery, 2016. Photography by silversalt.
A video and sculptural installation and a series of paste-ups for ANIMAL/MINERAL/PHYSICAL/SPIRITUAL, a group show curated by Chloé Wolifson at The Bearded Tit in August 2015. Featuring Rebecca Gallo, Sarah Goffman, Lisa Sammut, Louise Meuwissen + Lotte Schwerdtfeger.
Rebecca Gallo, Old Things, found objects, video. Installation view at The Bearded Tit, 2015.
Left: Rebecca Gallo, Old Things. Right: Lisa Sammut, of magnitude.
Rebecca Gallo and Chloé Wolifson, ANIMAL/MINERAL/
PHYSICAL/SPIRITUAL, paste-up in The Bearded Tit Laneway.
A series of sculptural propositions made with items sourced on-site at historic house Juniper Hall. Exhibited for The Many at Juniper Hall, September 2015. Curated by UNSW Art & Design Creative and Cultural Leadership students studying under Dr Julie Louise Bacon.
What does it mean to engage in a practice of collecting outside of an urban environment, and on Aboriginal land? These works were created on residency at Fowlers Gap Research Station, on Wilyakali land in far-western New South Wales in 2015. In Give and Take, a video depicts the lifting of quartz rocks from a small patch of earth, and those rocks are placed atop the video.
Rebecca Gallo, Give and Take, rocks, timber, video.
Rebecca Gallo, Temporary Monument, 2015, digital print, 60 x 90 cm
Installation view at Hidden: Rookwood Cemetery Sculpture Walk, September – October 2014.
Rebecca Gallo, Restitution, 2014, rocks, pipe, solar panel, fabric-covered cord, electronic components, video.
Exhibited in Will to Keep at 107 Projects, Redfern, May 2014. Featuring Jack Condon, Dan Connell, Pat Cremin, Saskia Doherty, Rebecca Gallo, Teelah George, David Greenhalgh & Katrina Stamatopoulos, Sarah Kukathas, James Nguyen, Lisa Sammut and Jack Stahel.
Rebecca Gallo, Collection: Marrickville/Balmain, 2014, objects collected on walks around Marrickville and Balmain, borrowed plinths, oil paint on cardboard and objects.
