The Familiar Ugly
July 19 - August 31, 2025


Cue the psychedelia – Basket Books & Art is thoroughly stoked to present The Familiar Ugly, a three-person exhibition featuring the work of Lauren Faigeles, David McDonough, and Kate Ruggeri. The assembled works evince a bold approach to chroma that is both pugnacious and charismatic: painting as uproarious missive addressed to a whiplashed now.

David McDonough is an artist and educator based in Queens, NY. David has shown in solo and group shows in and around the NYC area including recent shows with Good Naked Gallery, Paradice Palase, Studio Archive Project, Tappeto Volante Projects, Equity Gallery, and a solo show at One River School. He has received multiple awards and is a Dedalus Foundation Fellowship nominee. He is represented by Good Naked Gallery.

Kate Ruggeri is an interdisciplinary artist based in Portland, OR. She received her BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2010 and her MFA in Painting at Yale School of Art in 2016. Some places she has exhibited at are Abrons Art Center (New York, NY), Green Gallery (Milwaukee, WI), Roots and Culture (Chicago, IL), Olympia (New York, NY), and Specialist (Seattle, WA). She has held residencies at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, Ox-Bow School of Art and Artist Residency, and ACRE.

Lauren Faigeles (Younger than G-d), has visited exhibitions at museums across the globe including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Spain; the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. Faigeles has read The New York Times cover-to-cover on more than one occasion and reads The Brooklyn Rail when a friend sends her an article that is declared a “must read!” Faigeles has used the Google search engine to look at art she is too lazy to visit in real life. She visited Venice during the 2011 Venice Biennale but was unaware at the time that it was going on.