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About the Exhibition
Salon 21 is pleased to present “Vignette,” a group exhibition, opening to the public on September 12, 2025. This exhibition will be Salon 21’s first in its new location at Water Street Associates (WSA) in the Financial District. The group show includes works by Ben Cowan, Allyson Keehan, Thérèse Mulgrew, and Carly Owens Weiss.
“Vignette" brings together four contemporary painters whose practices embrace the materiality of paint while reimagining the quiet power of stillness, symbolism, and personal narrative. Through hyperrealism, art historical references, and investigations of the body, the works in this exhibition elevate the overlooked, such as objects, gestures, textures, into richly constructed vignettes that confront the complexities of identity, memory, and representation.
About the Artist
Thérèse Mulgrew is a painter based in Chicago, IL. She holds a BA in English Literature and studied at The Art Students League and New York Studio School of Painting, Drawing, and Sculpture. Influenced by her mother's surreal oil paintings and her grandmother's impressionist still lifes, she began to cultivate her own style which focuses mainly on depicting large-scale portraits and nostalgic still life in oil paint.
With a background in fashion photography and a deep appreciation for painterly intimacy, Mulgrew presents hyper realistic scenes that look like they were photographed in a studio with artificial lighting. The way she uses paint to trick the eye evokes the tradition of vanitas paintings in a way that feels both timeless and extremely current. Her paintings represent an attempt to explore vulnerability and intimacy. Inspired by cinema and photography, she works with a filmmaker to ensure her series mimic the experience of watching a short film - each painting acting as a still fleeting moment but when 3 viewed all together, reveal a more broad and deep narrative.
