Carillo’s paintings and polychrome wood sculptures usher us into an eerie, timeless world where space capsules land in Beverly Hills swimming pools, snail-size dinosaurs cavort on garden walls, and tomorrow never comes.

In both sculpture and painting, Carillo works with thin, translucent washes of brilliant color, then lacquers the surface to a high gloss. His obvious ease in the medium, plus courageous color sense produce jewel-tone surfaces of remarkable beauty.

His imagery encourages comparison with other artist-fantasts—Hieronymus Bosch, for one. They seemed to have tapped the same inner source for their imagistic subject matter, though Carillo’s symbols are undeniably contemporary. De Chirico and, perhaps, Dali are also suggested. But in the final analysis, Carillo’s vision is intensely personal, one unencumbered by the specious gifts of history.

—Virginia Allen