With a wink back at the resplendent marble busts and statues of ancient Greece and Rome, San Francisco artist Agelio Batle's Marble Pop Can is both ironic and irreverent. Although carved from the same translucent stone used in the grand history of Art and Architecture, it resists the requisite sanctimony by asserting its rather pedestrian form. Yet, while it mocks the pomp and formality of art history, it serves dutifully as a functional container; lifting its tab reveals a useful space for small storage.

• Can measures 4 3/4" x 2 3/4" x 2 4/4"
• Fine White Marble
  

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As I go about my normal day, I find myself attracted to anomalies: oddities of circumstance or material that snap me out of my “routine”.  For me, routine is complacent; a slow death. I think of art-making as cultivating a specialized anomaly. First, I rummage out objects that are part of my “routine”. They can be anything, really. I particularly revel in taking aim at things that are unquestioned fixtures, self-assured maybe, but mundane. Then, I zero in on a quality that might expose a “kink in the armor”.  With a playful attitude, I’ll add something to it, or take something away, in order to reveal its paradox. That object, which had previously affirmed the “routine”, might now divulge a transcendent irony.