Marianna Peragallo

Lives and works in New York, NY, USA

Artist statement

My anthropomorphic sculptures reimagine everyday objects of consumption and disposal, allowing them to misbehave, resist, or take on new roles. Plastic grocery bags, garbage bags, rubber cleaning gloves, and cut flowers become stand-ins for human experiences, humorously animated yet rooted in the weight of our cultural and ecological realities. Much of my work begins with observing the objects scattered through my daily surroundings. Plastic bags, for instance, are New York City’s tumbleweeds — carrying our things (takeout, groceries, trash, dog poop) and thanking us incessantly for our business. They scoot down sidewalks helplessly with gusts of wind, handles flailing like arms. To me, they are icons of overconsumption and disposability, but also unwitting characters existing among us. These objects also carry personal narratives. By anthropomorphizing them, I project onto them experiences of humor, grief, queerness, play, and resilience. They also reflect the in-betweenness and surreality of being an immigrant, living between worlds without fully inhabiting either. A sagging garbage bag nurtures a late uncle’s pothos plant, transforming what once held his discarded belongings into a vessel of growth. A pair of rubber gloves recalls the tenderness and caretaking of my grandmother’s hands. Knotted Anthuriums — a bisexual flower — safeguard a small flame, both fragile and enduring. In these works, what is typically discarded becomes a mirror for the overlooked and the...

Artwork