Carla Pagliaro has exhibited her work extensively at major galleries in Los Angeles, including Palm Springs Desert Museum, Newspace Gallery, James Turcott Gallery, Fisher Gallery U.S.C. and Irvine Fine Arts Center; and has had several private commissions. She holds a B.A. in art history from Wellesley College and received certification from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Locally, she has exhibited at The Danforth, the Livingston Center for Art & Culture and The Frame Garden.
“I did the first of these paintings in April of 2019 feeling that things were chaotic then. Little did I know how much worse it would get. They contain elements of everything I’ve done over the past fifteen years. I first paint the realistic elements and then proceed to obliterate a lot of what I’ve painted, creating a more and more abstract work. Often, my favorite and most time-consuming areas need to get painted out, something I find to be very satisfying. It’s liberating not to get too attached or precious about it. They are chaotic, because in these times that’s just what comes out. But, of course, it has to be coherent chaos, and that’s the tricky part. A lot of them are also pretty bloody. I’m not sure where that’s coming from, but it feels right so I don’t question it.” -Carla Pagliaro