Untitled #4 Sculpture

Jess Merlo’s forms stand as idle giants. Their texture is volcanic, imitating the pitted and abrasive surface of pumice stones and appearing just as deceptively light. These pieces have, in preliminary photographs, been positioned in front of drawings and their shapes suggest the line of wine of an uninterrupted and improvised pencil to page exercise. As if a testament to the possibility of achieving ‘the organic’ within overtly inorganic conditions of production, Merlo shapes and moulds expanding aerosol foam into curves and clots of white and speckled black. The surface layer oozes and overlaps at will in a fascinating synthesis of the fluid and the fast drying, evoking the bulging forms of Hans Arp and Barbara Hepworth. Written by Will Kollmorgen