For Giacomo Viscardi, collage begins in finding. It then meets destruction. With the cut of a razor blade, a character or image can be ripped from its original story, isolated and cast off from its world of meaning and tossed into the deep (or, a storage bag in the studio). Motivated by a fundamental belief that this part of the creative process mirrors the moments when our lives suddenly lose their narrative threads - i.e., when our worlds crumble about us and the constellations that once guided us home lead us into the dark,

Viscardi transforms diverse images, textures and materials from different continents and centuries into his debut exhibition, "What Dreams May Come." Thankfully, Viscardi holds, collage does not end in meaning’s breakdown. Viscardi believes collage is equally resurrective and reconstructive, asking in allegory: but what happens when we take the broken pieces of our lives and reconstruct with them? And so a bicycle rides amidst shooting stars and flying bottles of wine while birds swirl about dancers in the heavens; an inferno burns and beckons as renaissance religious imagery is reborn in a cave amidst 1950s technologic dreams; 21st century French newspaper stands as background to musical notes hovering about and forming webs of entanglement with saints and sinners and settings from across time and space; glamorous women from a mid-twentieth century French fashion lookbook catwalk against backgrounds of bold color, oil paint, birds, and cherubs; lacquer finishes, metallics, animals, and planes appear as a lone man is found adrift in the deep and a little girl surrounded by flower petals drifts into dreams.

Fifteen pieces come together in the first unfolding of Viscardi’s vision and ambition for collage, "What Dreams May Come." The exhibitioin will remain on display through December 4.