The House That Galen McCarty Turner Built

The story of an artist’s life as told through a tour of his things

Photography by Caleb Plowman
Illustrations by Jeremy Gregory

This is Galen McCarty Turner. Galen lives with Igby (his cat), who sleeps in the wheelchair, that’s next to the bear head, that growls from a shelf, that keeps the helmets, which Galen sometimes wears to the park. Welcome to the house that Galen built to shelter his art.

Actually, Galen didn’t build the house. He and some friends rent it from his dad. But inside and around it are many things he did build. Galen makes innovative neon sculpture in a two-story studio out back, which he built himself mostly from found materials.

The only son of a magician, Galen grew up on Salmon Beach. There he combed the shore for feathers, eggs, rocks, bones and anything he could carry home. He still collects all these things — and more. He collects so many things that he sometimes forgets what he collects (like the six-pack holders under the couch that will eventually be zip-tied together to make a hammock, or the jar of dead bees). When asked why he collects, he says it’s because he is a sentimental guy. Poking through one shelf, he picks up a tarnished trumpet mouthpiece (he has never played). “I don’t know why” — he laughs and shakes his head — “but I find this — the shape, the texture, the color, the patina, the weight of things . . . so sexy.”

Galen isn’t big on thrift stores. So where does he find these things? Things like a walrus baculum (penis bone), a Farah Fawcett cushion, a classroom skeleton? “Mostly just dumb luck,” he shrugs. That, and he knows people: people who throw things away.

Right now his favorite object is a piece of scrap metal, once destined for the underbelly of the Poseidon (an airplane that hunts submarines). He may not have a “use” for it yet, but that’s beside the point. The potential of the thing — what happens when he pairs it with something else; when he makes it do more than it is supposed to do — is what inspires him. Just like his art, the things in his house seem to say: Come in. Join the fun.  —Bond Huberman

Masks

Galen’s mask collection (from Venezuela to Hawaii) represents both Galen’s love of woodworking and his obsession with function. “I don’t decorate with masks. I wear them. I especially like the ones with holes cut on the side so people can smoke cigarettes with them on.”

The Chair

Galen found this chair abandoned on a Salmon Beach boardwalk when he was in high school. His dream for the thing? To create an interactive electric chair covered in live switches, lights, fans, a working microphone and a surprise air raid horn (that almost caused one sitter to vomit). It’s still a prototype — as he really does want the electric shock part to work (mildly). He tried, unsuccessfully, connecting an electric cattle fence to a dimmer switch — to give sitters some control of the current they encountered. He tested it on himself, which gave him quite a shock. “Turns out it’s all or nothing with those things.”

Helmets

 “I did a whole collection of helmets in college. Now I create them once in a while for Halloween costumes, races, whatever. They’re great canvases.”