2026 VISUAL ARTS EXHIBITION
EARTHLY DELIGHTS
June 6 – OCtober 31
Grounds + Lobby Gallery
Open Mondays–Fridays, 9am–5pm
The Sixth Annual Visual Arts Exhibition at Kaatsbaan Cultural Park presents Earthly Delights: artistic works evoking planets, plants, insects, and other biological forms erupting out of the mystical Kaatsbaan landscape. These unique pieces created by nine contemporary artists working predominantly in the Hudson Valley offer an inspiring alchemy of structure, form, beauty, and soul. The exhibition is curated by Hilary Greene.
This season, Aurora Robson returns with a tree-climbing, recycled-plastic installation new to Kaatsbaan. Joining her, Ian McMahon’s barn-mounted geometric relief, and Portia Munson’s mystical banner are six new artists: Thea Berman’s figurative oils and Sharon Broit’s biological abstracts in the gallery; Laura Battle’s esoteric ceramic clouds, Kris Perry’s machine creatures, and a spiritual carving by Nadia Yaron on the grounds; and sensorial videos by Virginia L. Montgomery mounted in the Stanford White Barn. In addition, we are honored to continue to exhibit two of Gaston Lachaise’s world-renowned bronzes on long-term loan by the Lachaise Foundation.
PUBLIC PROGRAMS
SATURDAY, JUNE 6
4:00–6:00 PM
OPENING OF THE 2026 VISUAL ARTS EXHIBITION
SATURDAY, JUNE 27
3:00–5:00 PM
OPEN HOURS
UPSTATE ART WEEKEND
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 6
1:00–3:00 PM
VISUAL ARTS WALK WITH CURATOR + ARTISTS
Thea Berman: Heaven Doesn’t LoveYou, Baby! (2025), The Monkey & the Swan (2025), Misc. En Scene (2024-2025), Home to You? (2025), Odyssey (2025), Hitting a Wall (Triptych) (2025), Fight Club (2025)
Sharon Broit: Heart Feels (2024), The Wind that Lets us Breathe (2023), Echoing Heart (2024), Inside my present self (2023), Even in the Quietest Moments (2018), The Conversation (2022), Feeling Mind (2023), Lightness of Being (2023),
Outside In, What went before also came afterVirginia L. Montgomery: Honey Moon in Blue (2025), Vestal Virgin Vengance (2024), Moon Moth Bed (2023), Luna Belle (2023)
Aurora Robson: Gypsy Moths (2018)
Gaston Lachaise: Floating Woman (1927)
Nadia Yaron: Venus Flower (2025)
Kris Perry: Sylph (2026), Mother and Child (2026)
Ian McMahon: Shrink Wall .001 (2023)
Laura Battle: Clouds (pareidolia) (2026)
Portia Munson: Flower Mask (2020)
Gaston Lachaise: Torso of Elevation (1912-27/1934)
Prices available upon request
In front of Long Barn
Clouds (pareidolia) (2026), Ceramic and steel, 5 1/2 to 6 1/2 feet
Laura Battle is based in the Hudson Valley. She has exhibited her work nationally and internationally at numerous venues including the Lohin Geduld Gallery, Rafius Fane Gallery, the Kleinart/James Center for the Arts at Woodstock Byrdcliffe Guild, the Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Arts in Peekskill, the Barn at Meadowbrook Farm in Upper Red Hook, the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center at Vassar College, the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Steinhardt Gallery at NYU, the Byrdcliffe Guild, the National Academy Museum, and L’Atelier du Caire. She has received grants and awards from the Peter S. Reed Foundation, the NEA, Fulbright Foundation, MacDowell Colony, American Academy of Arts and Letters, National Academy Museum, the Massachusetts Council on the Arts, and Bard College. In 2008 she was commissioned by the MTA Arts for Transit program to design windows for the Burnside Avenue subway stop. As a curator, she directed Kendall Art and Design in Hudson, NY. Laura studied at the Rhode Island School of Design and the Yale School of Art, and taught at Bard College from 1987 to 2023. Her work is included in numerous collections including the Library of Congress, Progressive Corporation, Rhode Island School of Design Museum, and as part of the Art in Embassies Program in Jeddah and Kabul.
@laurabattleartist
Studio Complex Lobby
Heaven Doesn’t LoveYou, Baby! (2025), oil on canvas, 16” x 20”
The Monkey & the Swan (2025), oil on canvas, 30” x 48”
Misc. En Scene (2024-2025), oil on linen, 38” x 62.5”
Home to You? (2025), oil on canvas, 11” x 14”
Odyssey (2025), oil on canvas, 12” x 18”
Hitting a Wall (Triptych) (2025), oil on canvas, 5” x 10” (each)
Fight Club (2025), oil on canvas, 30” x 40”
Thea Berman (b. 2002, New York City) lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. She received a BA in Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of California, Berkeley in 2024 and is a self-taught painter. Berman primarily works in oil on canvas, linen, or wood panel but occasionally expands her practice to include graphite and charcoal drawings.
Studio Complex Lobby
Heart Feels (2024), mixed medium on wood panel, 10” x 10”
The Wind that Lets us Breathe (2023), acrylic on linen canvas, 24” x 24”
Echoing Heart (2024), mixed medium on wood panel, 10” x 10”
Inside my present self (2023), acrylic on canvas, 24” x 24”
Even in the Quietest Moments (2018), acrylic on canvas, 43” x 43”
The Conversation (2022), acrylic on canvas, 12” x 12”
Feeling Mind (2023), mixed medium on wood panel, 8” x 8”
Lightness of Being (2023), mixed medium on wood panel, 10” x 10”
Outside In, acrylic on canvas, 43” x 43”
What went before also came after, acrylic on canvas, 43” x 43”
Sharon Broit’s work is shaped by her background in vintage textiles, where the structure of a weave and the history embedded in worn garments provide a foundation. By incorporating vintage fabrics, handkerchiefs, and pattern paper, she treats the canvas as a tapestry of lived experience. The tactile memory of these materials—along with the organic patterns observed daily—inform her paintings, turning each surface into a record of sensory experience.
@sharonlondondesigns
Entrance to Horse Field
Floating Figure (1927), Bronze, 51 ¾” x 96” x 22”
Pathway to Mountain Stage
Torso of Elevation (1934), Bronze, red-brown patina, lost-wax cast, 44 ¼” x 22” x 12 13/16”
Gaston Lachaise was called by ARTnews, “the greatest American sculptor of his time.” Floating Figure has been exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and at the Muse d’Art Moderne in Paris. Torso of Elevation has been shown at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Born in Paris and relocated to New York for most of his career, Lachaise played a critical role in the birth of American Modernism, pushing the boundaries of nude figuration with his innovative representations of the human body. The sculpture are on long-term loan from the Lachaise Foundation.
On Long Barn
Shrink Wall .001 (2023), Plaster, steel 8’ x 8’ x 16”
From massive temporal site works to explorative furniture, Ian McMahon’s work coaxes materials out of their everyday processes to extend the limits of what is possible. He is the recipient of numerous grants and awards including NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowships in 2014 and 2023 in Craft/Sculpture and a Virginia Groot Foundation Grant in 2016. McMahon’s work has been shown at venues including: Pierogi Boiler Room, Brooklyn, NY; Bemis Center For Contemporary Arts, Omaha, NE; Tang Contemporary, Beijing, China; DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, Lincoln, MA; among others. McMahon’s home and studio are located in Newburgh, NY.
In Stanford White Music Barn
Honey Moon in Blue (2025), Digital video
Vestal Virgin Vengeance (2024), Digital video
Moon Moth Bed (2023), Digital video
Luna Belle (2023), Digital video
Virginia L. Montgomery is an award-winning experimental filmmaker and multimedia artist working across video, performance, sound design, and sculpture based between Austin and Houston, TX. VLM is known for her surreal, synthesia-esque artworks which unite elements from mysticism, science, and her own neurodivergent world. VLM has had solo presentations with New Museum (NY), Times Square Arts (NY), Museum Folkwang (Germany), Wright Lab at Yale University (CT), The Lawndale Art Center (TX), Women & Their Work, Abroms-Engel Institute of Visual Art (AL), False Flag (NY), and Hesse Flatow (NY).
@virginia.l.montgomery
Pathway to Mountain Stage
Flower Mask (2020), Printed fabric scrim 14.5’ H x 16’ W
Portia Munson is a visual artist working in a wide range of media, focusing primarily on environmental and cultural themes seen from a feminist perspective. Recent solo exhibitions include: The Pink Bedroom, Museum of Sex, NYC (2023); Bound Angel, PPOW, NYC (2022); Flood, Art Omi, Ghent, NY (2022) and Memento Mori, Pamela Salisbury, Hudson, NY (2022).
@portiamunson
Adjacent to Long Barn
Sylph (2026), Steel and Bronze, 56”L x 41”W x 41”H
Mother and Child (2026), Steel and Bronze, 45”L x 41”W x 85”H
Born in Berkeley, CA, Kris Perry lives and works in Hudson, NY. Perry makes large-scale kinetic sculptures that cultivate an understanding of human experience by creating a visual language through form and gesture. Passionate about public art, he has been commissioned to construct pieces where people can gather to ask questions and share experiences. He currently has works on view at the Hudson Public Library, on Hudson’s Warren St., and the grounds of SoMo Village, Rohnert Park, CA. He has previously had public installations at Rockaway Beach- Queens, NY, Basilica Hudson- Hudson, NY, the Hudson Amtrak Station- Hudson, NY and other locations. In 2018, he collaborated with James Beard Award-winning chef Zak Pelaccio to create a series of sculptures that doubled as grills for the cooking festival Play with Fire. His much-heralded Machines (2012-13) combined industrial sound sculptures with live performance in collaboration with musicians Tommy Stinson, Elvis Perkins, Brian Dewan, and others. In 2015, he had his first solo show at R. Wells Gallery. A skilled metal fabricator, he has also worked with David Best on large-scale projects at Burning Man and public installations like Esperanza at a train station in Sacramento, CA. He is the recipient of several grants and residencies including the Voigt Family Sculpture Foundation (2014), Free103Point9 Media Distribution Grant (2013), and Peter S. Reed Foundation Grant (2012). His works are held in a number of private collections. Perry attended California College of Art and studied under illustrator Charles Pyle.
@krisperryart
Next to Horse Field
Venus Flower (2025), limestone and marble, 64” x 18” x 18”
Nadia Yaron is a Brazilian-born American artist whose abstract sculptural work investigates the deep connection between humanity and nature. Her sculptural work, crafted from wood, stone, and metal, embodies themes of impermanence, infused with elements of devotion, joy, and hope. Drawing inspiration from her rural environment, Yaron captures fleeting yet sacred moments, such as a blooming flower, or a pink cloud, to illustrate the transient nature of existence. She frequently assembles her individual sculptures vertically into larger, human-scale forms that reflect the unity of humans with the natural world.
Behind Farm House
Gypsy Moths (2018), 3 welded plastic-debris individual sculptures, solar panels, hardware, and LEDs, dimensions vary
Aurora Robson is a Hudson Valley-based visual artist known predominantly for her innovative, meditative work intercepting the plastic waste stream. Born in Canada, Robson grew up in Hawaii, then lived in New York City, where she studied metal welding at Apex Technical School, earning her New York State metal welding certification, and then completed a double major in art history and visual art at Columbia University.
For over twenty years, Robson has been developing techniques for sculpting with plastic debris, including fastening, weaving, sewing, threading, ultrasonic and injection welding, and 3-D Printing. A recipient of the Pollock-Krasner Grant, a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in Sculpture, a TED/Lincoln Re-Imagine Prize, and a National Endowment for the Arts Art Work Grant, Robson is also the founding artist of Project Vortex, an international collective of artists, designers, and architects innovating with plastic debris.
@aurorarobson