Monica Valdez Harb: Altar-Structures @ GearBox Gallery

There is always something that draws me to ideas of appreciation and adoration in my work. I am interested in creating a structure or a compilation built out of parts, fragments, and essences from everyday reality. I would like to elevate these details of everyday life and assemble them into a form that feels, in a way, transcendent. Picking from parts of reality: whether it be pastries, plant-life, clothing, buildings, an archway, and then transforming them into something other. At the same time, I aim to create some sort of unknown sculptural presence in a pictorial realm. In this way, the relationship between the known and the unknown world of objects and structures is what I find fascinating.

I’m interested in assembling an object from different parts into something that is idealized. For example, connecting architectural details of a visit to a cathedral, combined with a walk in a grove, and coming across a tree wrapped in fungi. Furthermore, experiencing the weight and solidity of an intense color combined with the bounce of a ruffled silk ribbon. When I look back at my experiences, it is the particular characteristics that have become memorable. These distinctive details form a whole structure or object in my work that becomes something other than reality.

~ Monica Valdez Harb