Monstrare
Belong Gallery | Chicago, IL
September 30 - November 5, 2022
“Is it better to out-monster the monster or be quietly devoured?”
MONSTRARE is a material exploration in ceramics to create a play of small new monstrous forms. The materials are harvested from just below the earth’s surface, and the resulting work is a whimsical speculation of what future histories lie there. These whistle sculptures/instruments are incarnations of fictitious beasts. The images included are photographs of holes exposing clay, they are documentation of earthly lacerations by human force. These holes are the potential portals (or port holes) from which these creatures have emerged.
The material in this exhibition is store bought clay, a combination of minerals commercially strip mined throughout the world, and local clay, the found junk from various holes in the city where friends, contractors, or the artist have dredged. Working with clay material is intuitive, an exchange of McCarthy’s force and the reception by a pool of semi-magnetic mineral platelets. The kiln firing process also reveals another element of chance, pushing against the artist’s physical control. McCarthy finds comfort in the unknown, because that is the humus for possibility. These monsters are language for life beyond humans, instruments for the past and future.
