Visiting artist Lucia Monge will be exhibiting a sculptural installation titled Against the Grain featuring an amaranth ovary surrounded by a representation of corn and soy crops in metal. The project examines the relationship between GMO crops and Amaranthus palmeri, a plant known as a "superweed" in the US and a "superfood" in Peru where she comes from. Amaranth has multiple indigenous relatives and a rich cultural tradition in the Americas. The project challenges how the term "invasive" is weaponized in the interest of homogeneity, unfolding a story of exploitation, tyranny, and resilience.

Bio: Lucia Monge is a Peruvian artist whose work explores the ways humans position ourselves within the natural world and relate to other living beings, especially plants. Some of her recent projects include exploring interspecies vulnerability and material circularity through plant respiration, a "fungi broadcast" about deforestation in the Amazon, sending potato seeds to space as messengers for non-colonial visions of space travel, and organizing "walking forest" performances that have led to the creation of green spaces in Lima, London, New York, Paris, and Pamplona.

Monge has shown her work internationally, including at the Museum of Latin American Art, Queens Museum, Whitechapel Gallery, Museum of Contemporary Art in Lima, the United Nations Climate Change Conference, Ars Electronica, and the Havana and Shenzhen biennales. She has received grants from the Oak Spring Garden Foundation, Peruvian Ministry of Culture, COAL, and Foundation for Contemporary Arts, among other. Her work has been featured in publications such as MoMA’s Uneven Growth, Global Performance Studies, Let's Become Fungal, The Work of Art in the Age of Planetary Destruction, and Lejos de la Tierra, among other.

She holds an MFA from Rhode Island School of Design and a BFA from Universidad Católica del Perú. She is a founding member of FIBRA art collective, and Assistant Professor of Art at Amherst College.

Lucia Monge Website