Dario Robleto

Dario Robleto is one of my all time favorite artists. I first saw his work at the Weatherspoon Art Museum in Greensboro, NC (http://weatherspoon.uncg.edu/) and was recently reminded of how much I love him at The Frye Art Museum here in Seattle. (http://fryemuseum.org/)
Robleto uses unconventional materials in a way that might horrify most people. The first works of his that I saw were collage multimedia posters surrounded by paper flowers that I later found out were made out of actual letters written from soldiers at war to their loved ones back home. They were not made from copies of the letters but the actual letters themselves.
Other pieces in the Weatherspoon show included a drawer with buttons inside that were made from bone and a tiny rocking chair also made from bone.
The way that his work was explained by the assistant curator at the Weatherspoon was as such; When someone catches a fly ball at a baseball game does that ball hold the same meaning as one that you might purchase at a sporting goods store? It does not. It could not be replaced by the ball that is purchased because it does not hold the same sentiment for the owner. So what is it about the ball? Is it something that is in the chemical makeup of the ball? What if the ball were to be turned into something else? Does it still hold the elements that made it something of sentiment in the first place?
Robleto first began making art when he melted down some of his parents record collection in order to turn them into sculptures and creations. !!! He does some work as well with EVP (Electronic Voice Phenomena) or white noise. I have only seen one piece of his that involves this media but it seemed to go nicely with the theme of what it means for an object to contain sentiment.
Most recently I saw work of his at the Frye Art Museum in their recent exhibit, Old, Weird America. Robleto's work fit in perfectly with the feel of...well...old, weird America. His work was in the company of art by Kara Walker and Cynthia Norton. The pieces of Robleto's in this exhibit were very Americana and constructed from unusual media such as hair braids that were made out of pieces of audio tape of Sylvia Plath reading November Graveyard and paper made from soldiers letters home to their mothers and daughters.
I recognized his work instantly in the gallery because of the paper flowers and small carefully constructed objects.
I certainly love love love his artwork and the concepts behind the work.
This is not his official site (which I could not find for the life of me) but it has his bio and info about a current project. http://www.artistsrespond.org/artists/robleto/