TheCritLab

🖤 The CRIT LAB — Fall Applications Are Now Open Labs begin in September. A space for critical dialogue, creative growth, and rigorous artistic practice. Apply at link in bio Image: Rebecca Steiner, Prime Time, 2020–2024. Collage constructed from cut-and-pasted printed paper, 8 1/2 x 8 7/8”

Spring season at The Crit Lab ✨ 
Introducing the Tuesday AM Main Lab, a cohort shaped through thoughtful dialogue, sustained attention, and the generous exchange of ideas. Across disciplines and approaches, these artists gather each week to challenge perception, expand critical language, and deepen the relationship between studio practice and community. A space for experimentation, vulnerability, rigor, and the slow unfolding of artistic thought. 🌿 Tap each image to discover the artists more deeply ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Explore the cohort here: Tuesday AM Main Lab ✨

Introducing Fall Wednesday Next Level Lab artist Rima Grad ✨ Through curiously inquisitive and wry observances, Grad’s work reflects askance a nostalgic impulse toward delicately fractured sensorial memory. Moving between subtle humor, reflection, and poetic dissonance, her practice traces the textures of recollection through gestures, fragments, and shifting associations. Layered with intimacy and quiet tension, her works invite viewers into spaces where memory flickers between clarity and distortion, tenderness and estrangement. We’re excited to welcome Rima to this season of Duet Lab at The Crit Lab.

A huge thank you to everyone who came @baugallery this past weekend to celebrate the opening of three shows, BAU Invitational, Surprise Garden @karen.allen.artist and Stillness Speaks. I’m deeply honored and grateful to the friends, collectors, and supporters who came from near and far to experience Stillness Speaks, my installation dedicated to the memory of Mark Goldfarb. @joanwilson99 One of the threads that runs through this exhibition is love. Love for my dear friend, love for the planet, the natural elements are part of my practice, it nurtures and sustain us, and love expressed through community, connection, and care. In that spirit, a percentage of proceeds from works sold will be donated to @transformationkitchenorg Transformation Kitchen, a new nonprofit in Beacon founded by my friend at @hudsonvalleykitchen , and dedicated to helping transform the lives of marginalized populations through viable employment opportunities. Thrilled the big piece in window found a home opening night. Ty. The opening also ended with a heartfelt surprise: a visit from fellow @thecritlab @elizabethmlindy , who rushed over from her own wonderful show to offer her well wishes at the very end of the evening. I’m feeling blessed beyond measure. BAU gives us complete freedom and unrestricted opportunity to dream, and invent. Fortunately I have had the curatorial vision of Karlyn @kb_creativeconsulting , her steady hard allows me have the inner space for next steps. This is my 3rd project with her, she helps me thread the needle. Ty Karlyn, my art anchor. I hope you’ll come visit Stillness Speaks when you can truly be with the stillness and quiet of the experience, and find your own still point. My artist talk will be held on June 7 at 4pm with Carol @bouyoucos , who is part of our BUA Invitational, and recently installed 9 Arches Waterfront @peekskillartsalliance I’ll also share when I’ll be gallery sitting, and I look forward to welcoming you back. #sculpture #photography #hudsonvalleyartists #beaconarts #environmentalart

Introducing Fall Duet Lab artist Deborah Peeples ✨ @debpeeplesart Swirling, whirling, joyful, and enigmatic, Peeples creates ecstatic visual soundscapes of circles, movement, and saturated color. Her compositions pulse with rhythm and vibration, unfolding through layered forms that feel both meditative and electric. Through repetition, abstraction, and luminous chromatic intensity, her work invites viewers into immersive spaces where color becomes sensation and movement becomes emotion. See more of her work at

Let’s look at the labcoats. Threaded through the MUSSEL MEMORY exhibition are questions about knowledge, how different ways of knowing are valued, or not. How are ecosystems affected by these values? To learn more, come to our artist talk/ecoart dialogue featuring intrepid Urban Waterways Researcher Samia Cohen and Priscilla Stadler on Sunday, May 17th, from 12:30 -1:30. While you’re here check out the creative communal space @alterworkstudios with its skilled artists sharing their work for @LICAO ! Working with labcoats enables me to unpack the scientific authority these garments represent. Stitching onto them is drawing with thread. Two of the coats connect with my work with Oracles and divination. They’re intended to be worn during participatory conversations for public engagement. Others offer tribute to the intrepid native mussels returning to the Creek, and a scientist (a malacologist studies mollusks). These labcoats were created to be worn. I envisioned them hung on branches, a vision facilitated by the magic of collaborating with the amazing @artistrachelg who helped make this, and so many other aspects of MUSSEL MEMORY, come to life. This installation-within-the-installation of the labcoats speaks of woundedness and healing, of bodies of water, of animal bodies (such as human and mussel bodies), of disability, connection, of “misshapen limbs”, of knowledge, of courage. All four labcoats worn by dancers in the recent prelude to @chrisbisram_ ‘s Shakun Davi Dance group’s performance of Mussels in Motion. Thank you! Photos: @renesingbrooks , Terry Blanchard, Priscilla Stadler MUSSEL MEMORY: Priscilla Stadler’s creative investigation of Newtown Creek Through May 21, 2026 Artist talk/ecoart dialogue Sunday May 17th, 12:30–1:30 Open daily 12-9 Meet the Artist Tuesdays 5-8, Saturdays/ Sundays 4-7 Let’s look at the labcoats. Threaded through the MUSSEL MEMORY exhibition are questions about knowledge, how different ways of knowing are valued, or not. How are ecosystems affected by these values? To learn more, come to our artist talk/ecoart dialogue featuring intrepid Urban Waterways Researcher Samia Cohen and Priscilla Stadler on Sunday, May 17th

Crit Lab Fellowships — Applications are now open. Each semester, The Crit Lab awards fellowships to talented artists who are ready to grow their practice, merit-based, meaningful, and built around you. Available for Main Lab and NxtLvl Lab. Apply via the link in bio. 🎨 Matt Carrano, The Alphabet of Trees - Autumn, 2025, acrylic and collage on canvas, 24×20” #TheCritLab #ArtFellowship #ArtistOpportunity #ContemporaryArt #ArtCommunity

Please come by and say hello! Tracing Radiance is on view this weekend only. May 8 - 9, 2026 Saturday Hours: 12 - 5 pm The Linen Factory 168A Irving Avenue (5th Floor), Port Chester, NY **Use the Irving Ave entrance and take the elevator up to the 5th floor. The exhibition brings together sculptural installation, photographs, video, and ink drawings that ask: how does a body, a surface, and a trace come into being, hold together, and begin to come apart. #paperartist #beaconartist #hudsonvalleyartist #westchesterartist #thecritlab @artpluseverywhere @clark_mfa @lesley_mfa

Today! Almost ready for Open Studios! More info tomorrow!

We left Everett on April 30 and today is May 6th. Many adventures and misadventures, but I am now settled and open studios are on Friday and Saturday. Tomorrow I am hosting a gathering at MAPSpace from12:30-1:30pm with snacks and conversation. Stop by if you are in Port Chester.

Opening in 3 days. A new pop-up solo exhibition of sculptural installation, photography, video, and ink drawings exploring the body as surface, vessel, and trace—where forms hold, release, and return through cycles of inscription and dissolution. May 8–9 Reception Friday, 4–8 pm Saturday: 12–5 pm The Linen Factory / Open Studios 168A Irving Avenue (5th Floor), Port Chester, NY #thecritlab #clark_mfa #lesley_mfa #artpluseverywhere #risdalumni #artswestchester #beaconarts