Saturday, February 28, 2026

Capitalism, but make it Art; Development, but make it Satire


Two weeks into his ARTS 14C Special Project residency, Lorel Hill is building a company.


Not a real one. 

A fake one.

But also…kind of real.


Lorel is a sculptor who makes mini dioramas — intricate miniature landscapes inspired by what he calls “degenerate places”: post-industrial lots, under-highway forests, abandoned buildings at the edge of cities. 


The kinds of spaces where foxes, bats, graffiti artists, teenagers, and runoff water all coexist. 


The kinds of spaces that feel more alive than a manicured state park.

Lorel Hill, Danger, Large Rats

48 in x 36 in x 18 in, 2025

His practice has long been about the collision of infrastructure and wilderness — from canoeing the polluted Hackensack River to exploring abandoned buildings in Berlin during the pandemic. 


Last year, he recreated sites around the Meadowlands — liminal zones that have resisted development for centuries — imagining mutant rats, state task forces, poison barrels, and collapsing infrastructure co-existing within the landscape.


Now, in his Special Project residency, the work has shifted.


Instead of just observing these “degenerate spaces,” Lorel is asking:

What would it look like to intervene?

Lorel Hill's Sketchbook 

Enter PoND Ventures LLC — short for Productivity of Natural Degeneration — a fictional development company headquartered inside the largest mini diorama he’s ever built. The site is inspired by a real boarded-up industrial building in Jersey City’s Communipaw neighborhood, wedged between luxury condos and empty lots.


In Lorel’s version, the building becomes part community orchard, part swimming pond, part ecological reclamation hub. The top floors? Corporate headquarters.


But here’s the twist:

Even a “good” company, operating inside our economy, has to answer to the laws of the market.


So PoND is both hopeful and unsettling. It proposes real ecological repair while satirizing the fact that any redevelopment effort is trapped inside market logic. Can you heal land and build community if you still have investors to answer to?

Letterhead from Lorel's Special Project Application

To push the idea further, Lorel is expanding beyond sculpture. He’s designing a wearable “field uniform” for PoND employees (himself included), blending hiking gear, urban fashion, and recycled materials.


He’ll perform as a company rep during ARTS 14C's Open Studio events — pitching PoND’s first product line: urban enhancement pills.


Think gas-station supplement marketing, but for ecological adaptation.


Capsules that grow climbing nails.


Skunk balm to evade surveillance.


Buoyancy boosts for polluted water.

Lorel Hill, Dream Mound

27 in x 30 in x 20 in, 2025

It’s funny. It’s absurd. It’s a little grifty. 

And it asks a real question:

Can you fix a broken landscape using the same systems that broke it?


Come visit PoND's headquarters on March 15th, at 157B 1st St, along with the other artists in our Spring 2026 Special Project cohort. If you want to keep up with Lorel's practice, you can find updates on his website.


See you next week!

The Team at 14C

Want to become a Project 14C resident? Four applications are currently open: 12-month, Special Project, Teacher Residency, and our Semiquinticennial Fabric + Textile Residency.

ARTS 14C - 157B 1st St - 4-6th fls


Facilities tour - March 5, 1pm

Facilities tour - March 12, 1pm


Deadline to apply for 12-month residency: March 9, 11:59pm


Open studios: March 15,

Gallery 14C - 157A 1st St, 2nd fl


Art (Official) Intelligence - February 19 - April 2, 2026


Open hours - February 28, 1-4pm

Open hours - March 1, 1-4pm


Pop-Up Art Market feat. a Dance DJ Set by Gummi Bäron - Mar 6, 6-9pm

Click here to share or view as webpage

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info@arts14c.org

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Friday, February 27, 2026

Lew Allen Galleries opens Katherines Poeter :Paper Works, February 27, 2026

Opening Today, Friday, February 27th, 2026

KATHERINE PORTER: Paper Works

KATHERINE PORTER: Paper Works

KATHERINE PORTER: Paper Works

Opening Today, Friday, February 27th, 2026
The paintings and works on paper created by Katherine Porter (1941-2024) stand as one of the significant bodies of work in American Color Abstraction. Her place as one of its most distinguished women practitioners is marked by a remarkable career spanning nearly six decades. Her paintings and works on paper are held within the permanent collections of more than forty important national and international museums.
 
Her works on paper channel the complexities of her times into signal expressions resulting in high-energy oils and mixed media – pulsating with vibrant kinetic energy and employing a unique visual vocabulary: equal parts geometric, chromatic, and gestural. The noted late art historian Lydia Csato Gasman once described Porter's output as "the vast domain of spontaneity untamed." The artist took chaos and, through a remarkable capacity for creative spontaneity, transformed the subject into sheer brilliance. The expression demonstrates a rare virtuosity of creative freedom blended with technical discipline. The work serves as her personal cri de coeur, cry of the heart, for a better world. 
 

ANIMATION:
Katherine Porter, Global Warming, 2000, oil on paper, 29.5 x 25 in
Katherine Porter, Kingdom (detail), 1997-98, mixed media on paper, 45.5 x 42.5 in 
Katherine Porter, Untitled (detail), 1977, mixed media on paper, 20.5 x 27.75 in
 
 
EXHIBITIONS:
Herman Maril, Kendall Lane Beach / Cape Beach (detail), 1976, oil on canvas, 36 x 48 in
Forrest, Moses, A Bit of Stream, 2012, oil on canvas, 50 x 52 in
 
©2026 LewAllen Galleries | Artwork ©The Estates of the artists pictured

LewAllen Galleries
1613 Paseo de Peralta Santa Fe, NM 87501
505.988.3250
Mon - Fri  10 - 6 / Sat 10 - 5

Late Winter Blues Try Medation at Lehman College Art Galleries among the beauty of Creativity!!!!



Meditation in the Galleries

Ages 18+

FREE TICKETS REQUIRED


Meditation in the Galleries


Thursday, March 5, 2026


11:00 am –12:00 pm


Join us for Meditation in the Galleries at Lehman College Art Gallery. This peaceful, seated meditation experience invites adults ages 18+ to slow down and reconnect within the calm atmosphere of the exhibition space. Surrounded by art and immersed in a serene, light-filled setting, participants will be guided through a mindfulness practice designed to cultivate stillness, focus, and inner balance. Chairs will be provided for comfort. Whether you are new to meditation or an experienced practitioner, this restorative experience offers a unique opportunity to pause, breathe deeply, and engage with both the artwork and yourself in a meaningful way.


CLICK HERE FOR FREE TICKETS
ALL PROGRAMS TAKE PLACE AT LEHMAN COLLEGE ART GALLERY
250 BEDFORD PARK BLVD WEST
BRONX, NY 10463

Lehman College Art Gallery is located in the Fine Arts Building
Enter at Gate 5 on Goulden Ave

Lehman College Art Gallery’s exhibitions and programs are made possible through generous support from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature; the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs; the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs Initiatives through New York City Council Discretionary Awards; City Council Members Eric Dinowitz, Diana Ayala, Kevin C. Riley, Oswald Feliz and Kristy Marmorato, the Milton and Sally Avery Arts Foundation, Jarvis and Constance Doctorow Family Foundation, Pierre and Tana Matisse Foundation, Edith and Herbert Lehman Foundation, Jacque and Natasha Gelman Foundation, The New Yankee Stadium Community Benefits Fund and the Charina Foundation.

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