Moe Gram: Party Fouls - Phillips Exeter Academy

January 6 – April 11, 2026

Party Fouls explores the games and pains of growing up. Themes of play, frustration, empathy, and self-compassion interplay through fields of color and found objects. Featured artist Moe Gram transforms Lamont Gallery into a nostalgic birthday party with underlying subjects like maturation, responsibility, and the meandering road of life. The space brims with classic elements of celebration: sugary treats, streamers, Y2K paper games, and even a bouncy house. These playful touches, paired with sculpture, painting, and projection, craft a coming-of-age story that unpacks the trials and tribulations of growing older and losing one’s sense of play. Gram reminds us to rediscover curiosity in everyday life.

Within Gram’s birthday installation, she generates emotions of familiarity, sentimentalism, and longing for “the good ole days,” where childlike wonder and play were paramount. She drops clever breadcrumbs connected to “adulting” like overdue bills, how-to guides, and self-care tropes to remind us that growing older doesn’t always correlate to thriving. Life’s imposed milestones are never checked off simply by sticking to a single, linear path, after all. The journey doesn’t end, it just evolves.

Photo by Susan Sahab

Gram is a multidisciplinary artist living and working in Denver, CO, and works on a diverse array of mediums that include painting, mural, collage, and installation. Gram’s work is distinctive, engaging, and thoughtful. Through her playful color palette, messaging, and juxtaposition of unique embellishments and found objects, her work encourages the viewer to absorb and reflect – for the betterment of oneself and collectively for us all.

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Lamont Gallery programs are supported in part by the Michael C. Rockefeller ’56 Visiting Artists Fund.