Elly McCarthy is a transdisciplinary artist, educator, and technologist based in Chicago. They primarily work with metal and stained glass; their practice centers materiality, process, and craft. Drawing on their queer identity, background in mathematics, and experience with chronic mental illness, they interrogate divisions and impulses that arise interpersonally and societally. Prioritizing the act of paying close attention, Elly is compelled by subjects that seemingly contradict, but are ultimately intertwined: aesthetics and logic, concentration and deviation, structure and flexibility, precision and ambiguity. Ultimately, their practice stretches towards new imaginings of what is “right” or “possible.”