How Shallow

July 27 - August 25, 2019

Opening Reception:
Saturday, July 27, 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM

A collaboration with the Co-Directors of Monaco in St. Louis:

Ortega y Gasset Projects is pleased to present How Shallow, a group exhibition with works by Sage Dawson, Meghan Grubb, Allison Lacher, and Edo Rosenblith, four of the Co-Directors of the artist-run space Monaco in St. Louis. The opening reception is on Saturday, July 27, from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM, and the exhibition is on view until August 25.

How shallow. The wind stirs the surface of a shallow pool. The image invites us, then repels us. A surface, a pattern, is just a pattern. But past civilizations knew that meaning is always hidden in ornament, and vice versa. 

How Shallow presents four artists - Meghan Grubb, Edo Rosenblith, Allison Lacher, and Sage Dawson - working in mixed modes: abstract and pictorial; unidimensional and sculptural. How shallow? A fantasy. A flood. A magic carpet ride. An entrancing image. Abstraction hides itself from our picture-making, and a meaning-making look is looking back. Where flamingos gather, silhouettes on a miniature horizon: blank. Pejorative. Shallow people, shallow acts. There's not much to it, and not much depth. But who’s to say? Still waters run deep, so shallow waters churn and leap.  

Sage Dawson is a St. Louis-based artist, curator and educator. Her work examines dwelling rights, domestic labor, and the identity of spaces. She teaches at Washington University, if a founding member of Monaco, and directs STNDRD - a gallery project examining the power and potential of flags. Dawson completed an M.F.A. and Museum Studies minor at the University of New Mexico, and a B.F.A. at Missouri State University. Dawson has exhibited, lectured and presented work at various sites including the Center for Contemporary Printmaking Norwalk. Endless Editions EFA Project Space, the Urban Institute for Contemporary Art, The Pulitzer Arts Foundation, the Chicago Artists Coalition, the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, Tate Exchange at Tate Modern, Boston University, Terrain Biennial - Enos Park, the St. Louis Art Museum, the Springfield Art Museum, The Luminary, Pyramid Atlantic, the City University of New York, the University of Pennslyvania, the University of Toledo Center for the Visual Arts, and the International Print Center New York.

Meghan Grubb is a visual artist based in Saint Louis, Missouri. Her practice explores a range of subjects including wilderness structures, daylight rhythms, recursive spaces, and natural disasters. The resulting physical work ranges from immersive installation to sculptural objects – each outcome revealing unease between humans and the physical spaces that we inhabit. Grubb has completed residencies at ACRE, Wassaic Project, Paul Artspace and Vermont Studio Center, and has received awards and grants including the Regional Arts Commission Artists Fellowship, American Scandinavian Foundation Fellowship, and nominations to the Joan Mitchell Emerging Artist Grant and Joan Mitchell Painters and Sculptors Grant.

Allison Lacher is an artist and curator based in Springfield, IL. Her work orbits collaboration, site-responsiveness and installation. She is the Exhibitions Manager at the University of Illinois Visual Arts Gallery and she is a founding member of the artist-owned gallery Monaco in St. Louis, MO. In 2013 she Co-founded DEMO Project, a space for contemporary art in Springfield, and served as Co-director of the space until its demolition in 2018. She has been awarded residencies with ACRE, Spiro Arts, The Luminary, Signal Fire on US/Mexico borderlands, and was a full fellowship resident with Vermont Studio Center. She was a HATCH Projects curatorial resident and is a previous recipient of the Illinois Arts Council Fellowship Award. Her work has been featured in ‘From Here to There’ published by Princeton Architectural Press, NewCity Magazine, Temporary Art Review and FLOORR Magazine, among others.  

Edo Rosenblith (b. 1988 Tel Aviv) received his BFA in painting in 2011 at the Rhode Island School of Design and his MFA in Visual Art at Washington University-St. Louis in 2017. Rosenblith has exhibited throughout St. Louis, at The Contemporary Art Museum of St. Louis; The Center of Creative Arts, University of Missouri-St. Louis, and The Luminary. Rosenblith has exhibited nationally at, The International Print Center, New York; The Elmhurst Museum, Chicago and internationally, at Jenifer Nails Gallery in Frankfurt Germany. A two-year survey of Edo’s sketchbook drawings became the content of his first book, PINK, published by Fort Gondo Press in 2013. Rosenblith lives and works in St. Louis, Missouri and became a member of Monaco Gallery in 2019.