Greta Waller / 3 a.m. / Fernberger Gallery
- LA Art Documents
- May 30
- 2 min read
Greta Waller
3 a.m.
Fernberger, Los Angeles, CA
May 3 - June 28, 2025
Waller’s work explores impermanence through still life, landscape, and observational realism—drawing connections between beauty, fragility, and time. Each work in this exhibition feels diaristic, as Waller allows the viewer insight into her everyday life balancing mundanity with the fracas and unpredictability of her alternate career as a first responder. 3 a.m. refers to the time Waller is working; whether on her canvases, or in the midst of a 48 hour shift as a paramedic.
A sweeping, panoramic painting of Los Angeles anchors the exhibition. A small version, painted en plein air from the vantage point of Runyon Canyon Park (prior to the recent fire) served as the study for this monumental painting. The pristine, rose-tinted city, free from human presence, presents the city as a still life: a series of objects on the brink of a change of state; from day to night or perhaps night to day; from utter stillness to activity; or, as Angelenos recently experienced, from safety to calamity. This is a vista in flux.
Waller’s metier is the still life. She has, since 2008, devoted her practice to the paradox of painting ephemeral subjects with enduring presence. Her signature works depict large chunks of ice placed on decorative porcelain plates—melting slowly and irrevocably—echoing the Dutch still life tradition. These paintings are as much about time as they are about form: solid becoming liquid, stillness holding movement.
In 3 a.m., Waller incorporates new subjects that reflect the dual nature of her life as both an artist and paramedic. Electrocardiogram readouts, a lost tooth spit into a porcelain basin, the shined boots of her uniform, and even the ambulance itself, appear as totems of urgency and control—objects of precision and care that hint at the precariousness of the human condition. With the same stillness and clarity found in her ice paintings, these objects are also charged with narrative, fragility, and human urgency.
