Dani Lamorte on the work “Palo Verde”:

“My back yard is what some would call ‘a mess.’ Long, thin palo verde leaves in pale yellow are scattered across the dry soil like hay. Bits of ‘weeds’ poke up in a seasonal exchange. This isn’t the standard image of a garden, but it’s the kind of garden I want to which I want to attune myself: full of whatever chooses to live in a place, filled with slow decay and change. Full of surprises, too, as ‘weeds’ which are normally uprooted early in their lives grow tall and unusual.

For “Hidden Garden Games,” I would like to arrange the thin palo verde leaves in rays and lines, grids and shapes, to redefine the space and bring focus to some of these ‘weeds.’ My aim is to make something with what is already given, to dig into decay and change, and involve myself. I am thinking of this process as a multi-day performance, documented through video and photo, contemplating the ephemeral forms of nature.”

Dani Lamorte (b. 1986, Tucson, USA), artist.

Dani works with photography, video, performance, and text.
He has performed and shown work at the Andy Warhol Museum (Pittsburgh), University of Arizona Museum of Art (Tucson), Human Resources (Los Angeles), Whippersnapper Gallery (Toronto), Studio Beluga (Montreal), and Mattress Factory (Pittsburgh). Dani's recent writing has been featured in Journal of Critical Library & Information Studies, Edge Effects, Sundog Lit, Smithsonian Collections Blog, and Cactus Heart. Since 2012, Dani has performed as 'Maria Denolt,' a self-titled art critic, lecturer, and 'lofty person.' Through guerrilla tours at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, short video tours of exhibitions, and a one-minute podcast series, Maria humorously mixes art fact with art fiction to level critiques of both museums and their detractors. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Linguistics from the University of Pittsburgh, and a Master of Arts degree in Library & Information Science from the University of Arizona.