Dennis D'Ambrogio drives a UPS van in the city, and any doubts about his dedication to his work is dispatched once you get a load of his right gun, which is emblazoned with company logos going back to 1937. (We suspect he has the original 1916 logo somewhere, but we’ve only seen the one arm.) Obviously, he knows his way around a package. And packaging. And mail art, that all-welcoming genre whose only requirement is a successful delivery through a legal carrier — D'Ambrogio, for example. He’s perfect to curate a mail-art show, “Ersatz Group Exhibition,” since no doubt he’s spent many moments (brief moments — he looks like a guy who hustles) musing over a this or that envelope that didn’t seem to be much like the others. To cultivate the work, the gallery, celebrating its 35th anniversary, sent a call for submissions out to its vast member base, then set D'Ambrogio to work on what arrived via the post — or UPS, if anybody had a brain.
June 4-22, 2009
