Before naming their art show at Cargo, Aimee Miller and Calli Rampton cycled through possibilities. They wanted a name that encompassed their work’s slightly offbeat vibe and showed their reverence for items people might find otherwise unremarkable. Strange and Glorious? No, visitors would expect too much freakiness. Church of Everyday Objects? Getting closer. Finally, they settled on Ministry of the Mundane. It fits.

Calli Rampton’s artworks were inspired by Bernie Kaminsky’s papier mâché reproductions of every objects like potatoes and restaurant checks. But instead of crafting photorealistic copies, she recreates papier mâché objects from memory. The results are slightly off kilter, yet all the more real for it.

For instance, the saucer under Calli’s papier mâché teacup holds two sugar cubes the size of walnuts. Whose eyes don’t go straight to the sugar when they’re handed coffee? The teeth on her combs are irregularly spaced, and to look at them is to feel them tugging through your hair. Her lipsticks, all red and roughly identical, bear names like Well Red and Red Scare. Her cigarette package—“I don’t smoke, but I’m fascinated by cigarettes,” she says—shows a diapered baby with a cigarette dangling from his lips. “When people see my work, I want them to laugh,” she says.

Aimee Miller’s artwork also incorporates everyday objects, which she uses in intricate collages referencing ancient spiritual images like mandalas and orthodox shrines. Look closely, and you’ll find doll arms, wishbones, pieces of toothpaste tubes, and even tiny silverware she bought in a doll shop in Paris, often flourished with gold and silver and set in elaborate patterns.

“I like to think there’s another world parallel to ours with different etiquette, different social mores, and lots of pomp and circumstance,” Aimee says. She plays with found objects and ephemera to create tableaux depicting this fantasy world. Working at Cargo has inspired her, too, and over the years she collected staves from broken fans, milagros, porcelain frozen Charlottes, torn bits of Japanese magazines, Victorian scrap, and more to weave into these tableaux. (Learn more about Aimee’s work at www.aimeemillerart.com.)

See Calli and Aimee’s work at Cargo starting on December 4th! Their art show, Ministry of the Mundane, will be up to admire and purchase through the month of December. Open any day that Cargo is open - Wednesday through Sunday from 11-5pm.