Ethical Society of St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri

August 23 - October 17, 2026

Exhibition Description

Maddie Aunger’s intimate acrylic paintings revolve around the domestic spaces she interacts with. Still focuses on two significant homes, the one that she lives in currently, and the house where she began making this body of work. Spurred by the sudden shift from working in her campus studio during graduate school at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, to painting at the dining room table during the beginning of the pandemic, Maddie found herself drawn to the windows in the living room. At this time quiet moments of solitude, and recognition of the passage of time became essential to her practice.

The paintings in Maddie’s thesis exhibition Idylls, some of which are shown here, explored spaces around the home she shared with a roommate. The narrow scope of the show lead her to more deeply observe and interact with the space. This -slowing down- shed new light on beauty in the simple forms of windows and fences, and their interplay with light throughout the days and seasons.

Maddie’s work continues to play with composition, color, light, and space, but now focuses on locations here in St. Louis around her home and neighborhood in Brentwood. The intentional observation the paintings stem from brings with it a sense of reverence and care. Maddie finds the moments that she paints while going about regular routines. Surprises of light hitting strange surfaces, dynamic cast shadows, and unique reflected color draw her in. From there, compositional adjustments idealize and simplify the scene and remove distractions to hold the viewer in the moment. Still asks viewers to pause and observe spaces around them.