"What is not well known is that Grillo's efforts paralleled and in some cases anticipated developments in the East. While he was in San Francisco, Grillo produced a series of paintings which, for sheer inventiveness of technique, rivaled New York's avant garde. In their spontaneity and dramatic intensity, many of these paintings bear the hallmarks of classic gesture painting as it would be practiced by Franz Kline and Willem de Kooning. What is truly remarkable is that Grillo's work preceded any knowledge of these artists, as de Kooning had not produced his first one-man show and Kline had not yet moved in to abstraction. And anyone tempted to find Grillo's source of inspiration in Jackson Pollock should remember that Pollock was only just beginning to develop the drip technique that would later make him famous."

Susan Landauer "The San Francisco Years" Art of California 3