“I have always been digging. It’s one of my obsessions. As a child I would dig. One time while digging – the place had no rocks or gravel – there was an obstruction. It turned out there were bricks. Inside there was some sort of soil that was different in colour to the terrain. When dried it looked strange. And, when we put it on the fire, it fizzed and cracked and exploded”. He also found, separately, a little trap door and it contained batteries that were used for making radio contact. “In one place, I found spent bullets under some bricks. And shells – ammunition”. It turns out that the house was previously owned by a member of the anti-fascist resistance.
“If I’d had a good education, I’d probably have been an archaeologist. Italy is full of things underground.”
And dig he did. Once he had his own land in Southwestern Australia, Galliano excavated three significant installations at his Lake Clifton property.
For the River of Rocks, Galliano’s instinct to dig revealed the honeycomb structure of an ancient limestone seabed floor. This remarkable structure was previously unknown to the environmental authorities whose terrain this was.
River of Rocks I 
River of Rocks II
The Garden of Eden installation features, not surprisingly, a serpent. Galliano worked with his son Ernest to excavate a hole for this installation, using fire as a tool to loosen up the rocks. Again, the deep ancient seabed was uncovered with its channels and honeycomb patterns and it, in due course, filled with water. Together, father and son planted trees which are on their way to forming a dome of leaves across the waterhole.
Subsequently, after Galliano had killed a snake nearby – killed because of the snake’s proximity to the family home – the installation was named the Garden of Eden. Echoing Dreamtime imagery first seen in Australia’s Central Desert, a serpent was formed using the very Italian material of white marble tiles. Three dimensional white triangles from a separate exhibition were included, adding a contemporary geometry and spatiality to the timeless symbolism of a serpent, a waterhole and an enticing, tree-encircled oasis.
Garden of Eden I Garden of Eden II Garden of Eden III
On digging what is now known as The Pond, Galliano unearthed more of the deep honeycomb seabed floor found in the other two installations. As ducks, pelicans, turtle, marron (small freshwater crayfish) and snakes were drawn to it, it was simply titled “The Pond”, and stands as testimony to the power of looking beneath the surface and how Nature takes over once that work has begun.
Pond I Pond II Pond III
