ARTIST BIO
As a sculptor, muralist, printmaker, teacher,...Esther A. Grillo has no boundary to her work. She was born in Italy, raised in Brooklyn and resides in Rockaway, Queens. Grillo holds a B.F.A. and M.F.A. degree from Brooklyn College where she won a Graduate Fellowship for Sculpture. Grillo has shown work in solo and group exhibitions such as the Museum of the City of New York; Queens Museum, Palmer Museum, PA; Loft Gallery, Japan; New York and Federal parks; Xavier University, LA; Brooklyn College, NY; as well as 'alternative' spaces.
The 'In Search Of Harmony Bay' sculpture sponsored by NYCATA/UFT, won the NYC MTA/Creative Stations Arts for Transit Award Fund for temporary art. This 4 ft high by 40 ft. wide relief, adorned the Howard Beach/JFK train station. The allegorical composition was her communtary on racism. The NYC Department of Education later acquired and permanently installed the artwork on the exterior of Beach Channel H.S., Queens.
Ms. Grillo is known for her four, monumental murals on NY Parks Department sites on Shorefront Parkway, Queens. One of which won the Precita Eyes National Mural Award, CA. The murals were partially funded by grants from the Rockaway Chamber of Commerce, City Parks Foundation, Rockaway Artist's Alliance and Queens Community Arts Fund.
Her collaboration with Padrik Clark, glass artist, created the 39 ft. Roxbury 9/11 Memorial in Queens.
Grillo's sculptures and murals have been included in such books as: Glory Be, by Bruce Weber; Sculpting Clay by Leon I. Nigrosh; On the Wall, Four Decades of Community Murals in NYC by Braun-Reinitz and Weissman; and most recently Rockaway Beach: Art and Adaptive Capacity Post-Hurricane Sandy by Chris Viaggio. Her sculptures were also featured in issues of Ceramic Monthly, and Arts Magazine: as well as,The New York Times, Newsday, Daily News, Rockaway Times, and The Wave newpapers.
ARTIST STATEMENT
In my body of work, the human form is unified visually through the blending of mediums, the inventive use of trompe l’oeil as well as physically by high intensity heat. Far from minimalist attitudes, the work is inclusive, a dynamic case of multi-mediums offering multi-message.
Tim Higgins, art critic wrote, “Grillo’s assemblages and sculptural installations are sociopolitical narratives, an outpouring of what could be viewed as random, personal impressions of life, if it were not for the fact that her often surrealistic viewpoint borders uneasily close to the real...often striking a viewer’s own psyche like the bite of a cobra, usually deal with such dire subjects as suffering, the anxieties of modern life and the constraints of womanhood as she travels the thin line between out and out fantasy and brutal psychological revelation.”
My interest in presenting art free to the public has led me to the creation of four monumental mural seascapes on shelters located in Queens as well as the creation of In Search of Harmony Bay. This painted polymer concrete, high bar-relief sculpture was funded by MTA/Creative Stations Project Award for the Howard Beach/JFK train station platform. This relief now adorns Beach Channel H.S., Queens.
Cell: 646-346-0951