Hannah Lutz Winkler 😉

Final week: “Puppy’s Play and Punishment” ft new work by Aika Akhmetova, curated by Hannah Lutz Winkler Saturdays 12-6pm and by appt thru Feb 14 @ 53 Orchard Aika Akhmetova will be doing a performance in the 53 Orchard window from 1-5pm on Saturday 2/14 @hwinx @aigerimakh

‼️🚨🌞Divas, we have an urgent performance alert 🌞🚨‼️ Aika Akhmetova will be doing a performance in the 53 Orchard window from 1-5pm on Saturday 2/14 Final week: “Puppy’s Play and Punishment” ft new work by Aika Akhmetova, curated by Hannah Lutz Winkler Saturdays 12-6pm and by appt thru Feb 14 @ 53 Orchard @hwinx @aigerimakh

On view now: “Puppy’s Play and Punishment” ft new work by Aika Akhmetova, curated by Hannah Lutz Winkler In the storefront window, viewers see a web-like mass of retractable leashes, dog collars, chains, upholstery foam, and found objects, many specific to the Post-Soviet region, or to the artist’s preferred site of globalized everyday material culture—the dollar store. Akhmetova will perform within this installation: tethering themself to it, bowing in it, flaunting a repository of Puppy’s movements. A sinister energy lurks behind these shenanigans: looking closer, we notice Puppy’s range of motion is limited, as if by veterinary intervention, and that medical detritus litters the installation—Puppy, it seems, may have been coerced into belly button surgery. Saturdays 12-6pm and by appt thru Feb 14 @ 53 Orchard @hwinx @aigerimakh

On view now: “Puppy’s Play and Punishment” ft new work by Aika Akhmetova, curated by Hannah Lutz Winkler The taboos around sexual expression that initially inspired this project are re-played and transformed in the BDSM references in the work. Bondage and restriction reference kink acts and punishing societal constraints, all of it nutritious chow for Puppy’s defiant mischief. Puppy’s Play and Punishment is about re-framing brattiness and taboo as empowerment, fully letting go, and playing in the face of subjection. Saturdays 12-6pm and by appt thru Feb 14 @ 53 Orchard @hwinx @aigerimakh

Major collab with @natanlast coming soon spring 2026 BABYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!🌱💚🌱

On view now: “Puppy’s Play and Punishment” ft new work by Aika Akhmetova, curated by Hannah Lutz Winkler Aika Akhmetova (b. 1995 Almaty, Kazakhstan) is an interdisciplinary artist based between New York City and Almaty. In their performance-based practice, Akhmetova plays hard and leaves traces of naughtiness behind at any cost. They investigate all parts of themselves: Kazakh, queer, non-binary, kinky, homesick immigrant, animal lover, older sister, and brat. Akhmetova studied Painting at Rhode Island School of Design and holds an MFA in Visual Arts from Columbia University. They’ve had solo exhibitions at Ortega y Gasset Projects and A.I.R. Gallery in Brooklyn, and have participated in numerous group shows across the US, Central Asia, and Europe, including Fondazione Elpis in Milan, Smack Mellon in Brooklyn, The Bronx Museum of the Arts, The Jewish Museum in NYC, GAMU (The Gallery of the Academy of Performing Arts) in Prague as well as ARTBAT FEST in Almaty. Akhmetova participated in the AIM fellowship at The Bronx Museum of the Arts, LMCC Arts Center Residency on Governors Island, and Fire Island Artist Residency. They work as a teaching artist at Harlem School of the Arts and as a visiting instructor at Pratt Institute Saturdays 12-6pm and by appt thru Feb 14 @ 53 Orchard @hwinx @aigerimakh

Well well well, hello again divas, Below Grand is pleased to present Puppy’s Play and Punishment, a solo exhibition of new installation, performance, and video work by Aika Akhmetova. An opening reception will be held from 5-7pm on Saturday, January 17th, and feature a performance by the artist. More public performances will take place throughout the run of the show, with a schedule to be announced via the Below Grand Instagram. Puppy’s Play and Punishment started in 2023 as a studio ritual. Amid a wave of anti-LGBTQ repression in Kazakhstan, Akhmetova turned to a solitary routine for comfort and freedom: they wore a collar and bowed in front of a mirror before every studio session. This devotional, playful act sprouted tendrils: they clipped on retractable leashes, bound their hands into paws, and wiggled like a puppy. In Summer 2025, Akhmetova took this very private practice and Puppy character out into historically queer public spaces on Fire Island, digging on Cherry Grove’s purple-sand beaches and rolling in the dunes. The exhibition runs from Jan 17 to feb 14, 2026. Hope to c u there kiss kiss @hwinx @aigerimakh

🦴THIS SATURDAY 1/17 🦴 5-7pm 🦴 opening reception & performance 🐶 Puppy’s Play and Punishment 🐶 a solo show by Aika Akhmetova Below Grand, 53 Orchard St. NYC (curated by Hannah Lutz Winkler) The show is a semi-domesticated extravaganza of new performance, video, and installation work that forms the public debut of Akhmetova’s Puppy, an unruly young dog persona. Puppy’s Play and Punishment is about re-framing brattiness and taboo as empowerment, fully letting go, and playing in the face of subjection. The show will run through 2/14 and is on view 12-6pm on Saturdays and by appointment - DM me to set up an appointment ;-) 🦴🦴🦴🦴🦴🦴 @belowgrandnyc @aigerimakh

don’t talk to me or my gumb ever again

Showing these two pieces at @sidebitch_la ‘s current fabulous show, LET ME OUT, curated by the one&only @sssofie , on view on Sundays through 10/12. Cozy Cage Cube #1 and #2, 2025, Polyester fleece, fabric, and yarn on wire shelving cube, 14 x 14 inches. I made these pieces with the materials I used to build the cage/set for Meerschweinbau, the 32-hr durational performance Gumbo the guinea pig and I did at @stephenstreetgallery last April (last slide). The fleece and wire shelving cubes are what I have been making my guinea pig cages out of for the last decade or so, as part of a building style called “Cubes and Chloroplast” or “C&C.” As is my habit, I am working through the leftovers, chewing, weaving, and winding them together to make individual works I think of as part of the performance’s afterlife. Less pure records of what was actually present during the performance, more craft-adapted semi-historical objects.

One week since MEERSCHWEINBAU and Gumbo & I are still processing (me perhaps more than her, but who knows, and isn’t that the point?) the 32 hours we spent performing and living in the gallery. THANK YOU to everyone who came to see us irl at @stephenstreetgallery and THANK YOU to everyone who tuned in to the live stream. More pics and videos and documentation and spin-off projects are sure to come, but for now wanted to share a few fab shots from @rebeccasenn_ If you have any pics or videos of the performance you wouldn’t mind sharing with me, plz DM me and I will send a link to a folder where I’m collecting visitor documentation. I have a small herd of people to thank for helping make this project happen: the fabulous and rodent-freak-enabling @alexander__zev , (Gumbo’s gallerist and curator); my other gallery attendants @schonitzertime (Gumbo’s best friend), @agnes__walden (Gumbo’s biological aunt), and @_.wei (Gumbo’s one and only godparent); @natanlast (Gumbo’s father) for writing the best exhibition ess(h)ay & manymany other friends for talking me through the project as it developed, lending me electric blankets, teaching me the ways of Twitch, etc. 💚&🥬 , G&H

🩵🩵🩵 still (metaphorically) glowing and (physically) lightly toasted from three weeks making work in Providenciales as an artist-in-residence at @55_bmac 🩵🩵🩵 here is some documentation of my full immersion in the island-studio-gremlin spirit 🩵🩵🩵