Announcing the 2023 Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program Awardees
The Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program is pleased to announce the recipients of the 2023-2024 award of a year-long rent-free studio space in DUMBO, Brooklyn.
The recipients for 2023 are Simon Benjamin, Gaby Collins-Fernández, Joy Curtis, Luba Drozd, Danielle Gottesman, Jesse Greenberg, Carl E. Hazlewood, Esteban Jefferson, Mo Kong, Shaun Pierson, Shikeith, Elaine Stocki, Jason Stopa, Kevin Umaña, Kemar Keanu Wynter, Oscar yi Hou, and Mie Yim.
These 17 artists were selected from a competitive pool of 1,958 applicants by a jury comprising Phong Bui, David Brooks, Matthew Deleget, Doron Langberg, and Erika Ranee. The residency provides rent-free studio space for a period of one year, lasting from September 2023 through August 2024, with an open studios weekend to be scheduled for Spring 2024.
2023 Phillip Pearlstein Painter and Irving Sandler Prize
Oscar yi Hou is the recipient of the 2023 Philip Pearlstein Painter accolade. A dedicated member of the Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program Artist Advisory Committee, Philip Pearlstein co-founded the Marie Walsh Sharpe Space Program (now known as the Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program) in 1991 alongside Chuck Close, Janet Fish, Irving Sandler, and Robert Storr. Ronald Hall was the first recipient of this distinction in 2021, followed by David Atkin in 2022, which will identify an outstanding representational painter and ensure that a non-abstract painter be awarded a residency annually in recognition of Pearlstein’s ongoing commitment to referential art.
This year's recipient of the Irving Sandler Prize is Kim Brandt ‘21. Founded in 2019, the $2,500 prize is awarded annually to program alumni who share Irving’s concern for the “intentions, visions, and experiences” of artists.
Artist Bios
Simon Benjamin is a Jamaican artist and filmmaker based in New York, whose practice considers how the past ripples into the present in unexpected ways. Using the sea and coastal space as frameworks, his current body of work explores how lesser-known histories and colonial legacies impact on our present and contribute to an interconnected future. Most recently, his work has been exhibited at documenta fifteen, Kassel, Germany; Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Governors Island, New York; and Kingston Biennial, National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston, Jamaica. Benjamin has participated in residencies at Baxter St. CCNY, Light Work in Syracuse, NY, Lighthouse Works in Fishers Island, NY, Shandaken Projects, and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council— both on Governors Island in New York. simonbenjamin.com
Gaby Collins-Fernández was born and raised in New York City. She makes paintings that start on the computer and are printed and collaged before being stretched and painting. She thinks about how images bloom in the mind and online, aesthetic inheritances from history and personal image archives, the abstract languages of feelings, pop music, and repetition. Her work has been shown in solo shows at anonymous gallery in NY, and forthcoming at Nina Johnson in FL; institutionally at the Birmingham Museum of Art in Alabama and el Museo del Barrio in NY; and she has been featured in publications such as The Brooklyn Rail and artcritical. She is a recipient of a forthcoming residency at the Elizabeth Murray Art Residency, as well as at Yaddo (Saratoga Springs, NY) and The Marble House Project (Dorset, VT). Collins-Fernández is also a writer and an adjunct teacher, currently working with Pratt and MASS Art. She is a founder and publisher of Precog Magazine, and BombPop!Up. gabycollinsfernandez.com
Joy Curtis is an artist who explores her relationship with nature and culture through cloth. Cloth becomes a place to examine history, to recalibrate ways of being in the world, and to imagine richer connections between organisms and environments. Curtis holds an MFA from Ohio University and a BA from the University of Northern Iowa. She has exhibited her work at the Al Held Foundation (Boiceville, NY), the Museum of New Art (Portsmouth, NY), the Aldrich Museum (Ridgefield, CT), Pelham Arts Center (Pelham, NY), and Ceysson and Bénétière (New York, NY). She has had 5 solo shows at Klaus von Nichtssagend (New York, NY) and has participated in the Socrates Sculpture Park Emerging Artist Fellowship, as well as residencies at Stoneleaf Retreat and LMCC’s Swing Space. joycurtisartist.com
Luba Drozd is an installation artist working with site-specific sound, animation, and sculpture. Her works are composed using vibrations that form sonic spaces alongside sculptural projections. Her pieces touch on the universe’s timelessness, the transformation of nature, and the shifting awareness of time and matter, gesturing to how intangible spaces within us, such as memory, knowledge, and perception, are controlled and regimented. She is the recipient of the Guggenheim Fellowship, Bemis Sound Art and Experimental Music residency, NYSCA/NYFA Fellowship in Digital and Electronic Arts, MacDowell Fellowship, Yaddo Residency, Millay Colony Residency, Pioneer Works Technology Residency and BRIC Media Arts Fellowship. Her installations are commissioned and exhibited at such institutions as Smack Mellon, CPM, Dat Bolwerck, Hessel Museum of Art, and Eastern State Penitentiary Historic Site. Born in Lviv, Ukraine, she received a BFA from Pratt Institute and an MFA from Bard College. lubadrozd.com
Danielle Gottesman was raised in Israel and France, and is currently based in New York. She is a multi-disciplinary artist with a concentration in sculpture and special interest in site-specific work. Gottesman pursued her studies and exhibited work in the United States and internationally. She recently completed the Visual Arts MFA program at Columbia University and earned her BA in Fine Art from Central St Martins in London (UK). She has also completed programs at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna (Austria) and the Chelsea College of Arts in London (UK). danielle-gottesman.com
Jesse Greenberg is an artist and curator based between Brooklyn and Catskill, NY. His current body of works in oil pastels and pigment sticks are expressive dense hyper-color fields of marks with disrupting graphics. Depicting abstract yet seemingly familiar forms and spaces. Greenberg has shown extensively in galleries, and institutions primarily in NYC and internationally. Greenberg is currently the lead programming director of Foreland, an arts campus in Catskill, NY consisting of artists studios, exhibitions, events, classes and residencies. instagram.com/jesse_aran_greenberg
Carl E. Hazlewood, born Guyana, South America, graduated with honors from Pratt Institute, and Hunter College, CUNY. Parallel to his studio practice, Hazlewood co-founded Aljira, a Center for Contemporary Art in Newark, NJ. Recent honors include fellowships and residencies from MacDowell, Yaddo, and The Brown Foundation Fellows Program at the Dora Maar House in Ménerbes, France, Summer & Winter 2018; and The Bogliasco Foundation Liguria Study Center for the Arts & Humanities in the Village of Bogliasco, Italy, Fall 2018. His two year residency with the Art Cake Studio Program in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, ended Fall 2022. instagram.com/carle.hazlewood/
Esteban Jefferson's practice centers around issues of race, identity and the legacies of colonialism. Using photography, drawing, painting, and sound installation as forms of documentation, Jefferson paints the focal points of his compositions in great detail, creating a stark contrast between the subject or object in focus and the surrounding environment. The paintings are left intentionally unfinished, creating a raw style emblematic of his investigative process. Well known for his series, 'Petit Palais', first featured at White Columns, New York, in 2019, Jefferson’s latest works consider the related symbolism of flags and toppling of equestrian monuments in New York, through the lens of racial and colonial legacies. Jefferson was born in New York City in 1989. He received his BA and MFA from Columbia University. Recent group exhibitions include ‘Art on the Grid’, Public Art Fund, New York (2020); ‘ESTAMOS BIEN: La Trienal', El Museo del Barrio, New York (2021) and ‘Open Call’, The Shed, New York (2021). Jefferson lives and works in New York City. instagram.com/estebanjefferson
Mo Kong is a multidisciplinary artist, researcher. They received an MFA from Rhode Island School of Design. They have been the subject of solo exhibitions at Queens Museum (New York), CUE Art Foundation (New York), Cuchifritos Gallery (New York), Artericambi Gallery (Verona), Gertrude Gallery (Stockbridge), Chashama (New York). Their work has also been included in RISD Museum, SFMOMA, Children’s Museum of Art, Mana Contemporary, Noguchi Museum, Spring Break, ARTISSIMA, Make Room Gallery, Hesse Flatow Gallery, and Rubber Factory Gallery. Mo has also received fellowship/residency from Macdowell Colony, Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture, Triangle art association, The Drawing Center, Mass Moca Studio, Vermont Studio Center, Lighthouse Works, and Artists Alliance LES Studio Program. They have been finalists of Artadia, NYFA fellowship (Architecture/design), and the Van Lier fellowship. Their work has been mentioned in Hyperallergic, Artforum, Art in America, Cultured magazine, Artnet Bomb magazine, Artpaper, CoBo Social, Wall Street International, SFMoMA Public Knowledge, etc. mokongmo.com
Shaun Pierson is an artist working with both photography and video. He uses the camera as a tool to explore the transactional relationship between the photographer and the sitter, working in the intersection between sexuality, shame, and desire. Pierson received his BA from Rowan University and MFA from the Yale School of Art. shaunpierson.com
Shikeith interrogates the sociopolitical structures and histories that oppress the psychological landscapes of marginalized communitie with a multidisciplinary practice,. Shikeith holds a BA from the Pennsylvania State University, and an MFA from Yale School of Art, and his work is in the collections of several prominent museums. He has exhibited internationally and received awards, including the 2022 Pittsburgh Foundation's Exposure Artist Award and the 2019 Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters & Sculptors Grant. shikeith.com
Elaine Stocki is an artist based in Los Angeles. She holds degrees in both Chemistry and Fine Arts from the University of Manitoba and an MFA from Yale University. Stocki has exhibited at Nicelle Beauchene Gallery, New York; Night Gallery, Los Angeles; Thomas Erben Gallery, New York; the Philadelphia Museum of Art, PA; Deutsche Guggenheim, Berlin; and the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO), Toronto, among others. Her work has been reviewed in the New York Times, The New Yorker, and Border Crossings Magazine. In 2019, Stocki's first monograph was published by SKIRA Paris on the occasion of a ten year survey of her work at the Canadian Cultural Centre, Paris. Her work is included in the permanent collections of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Stocki is a past resident of the Mountain School of Arts and is represented by Night Gallery. instagram.com/elainestocki
Jason Stopa is a painter and writer living in Brooklyn, NY. He received his BFA from Indiana University and his MFA from Pratt Institute. He is a contributing writer to Hyperallergic, The Brooklyn Rail, Momus and artcritical. He is represented by Morgan Lehman, NY, Diane Rosenstein, LA and Sevil Dolmaci, Istanbul. Stopa teaches at Pratt Institute and works for an academic journal at Columbia University. jasonstopa.com
Kevin Umaña grew up in El Salvador and Los Angeles. He received a BFA from San Francisco State University in 2014 and lives and works in Kansas City. Umaña is the co-founder of The Ekru Project, an artist-run Kansas City gallery focused on contemporary, emerging and underrepresented artists. In 2017, he created a permanent installation at The United Nations Headquarters in New York City. He has completed residencies at The Center for Book Arts, New York City (2019); Plop Residency, London, England (2018); and SIM Residency, Reykjavik, Iceland (2018). His work was featured in “Pattern Recognition,” curated by Amy Lincoln at Sperone Westwater in 2022. Institutions owning his work include The United Nations Art Collection, Fidelity Mutual Funds Collection, Center for Book Arts Library and The Marin Museum of Contemporary Art. kevin-umana.com
Kemar Keanu Wynter holds a BFA from the SUNY Purchase School of Art and Design. His work was the focus of recent solo exhibitions at Encounter, Lisbon, Portugal (2023), Klaus von Nichtssagend Gallery, New York (2021) and Tiger Strikes Asteroid, Queens (2021). He has exhibited in several recent group shows including Notes on Ecstatic Unity, OTP Gallery, Copenhagen, Denmark; Faraway Nearby, North Loop Gallery, Williamstown, MA; Friends and Family, Magenta Plains, NY; Shining in the Low Tide, Unclebrother, Hancock, NY, and I Saw it Hang Down There, Bode Projects, Berlin. Wynter has been an artist-in-residence at The Macedonia Institute, Anderson Ranch Arts Center and Ox-Bow School of Art, as well as ARoS Kunstmuseum in Aarhus, Denmark and AQB in Budapest, Hungary (both facilitated by Flux Factory, New York). His work is held in the collection of the Art Galleries at Black Studies at the University of Texas, Austin. Wynter has a forthcoming solo exhibition with Klaus von Nichtssagend Gallery along with a two-person presentation at the Independent Art Fair in May 2023. cowfoot.studio
Oscar yi Hou, Philip Pearlstein Painter, is an artist and writer based in Brooklyn, NY. He was born and raised in Liverpool, England. He received his BA from Columbia University, New York. He has also studied at The Sorbonne Art School (École des arts de la Sorbonne). Alongside his solo exhibition East of sun, west of moon at the Brooklyn Museum, yi Hou was recipient of the third annual UOVO Prize in 2022. Previously, he has exhibited at James Fuentes, New York; New-York Historical Society; Asia Society, New York; Royal Academy, UK; T293 Gallery, Rome; Kohn Gallery, Los Angeles; and Sprüth Magers Online. His work is included in the collections of the Brooklyn Museum; Columbus Museum of Art; Grinnell College Museum of Art; ICA Miami; M+ Museum; and the New-York Historical Society. oscaryihou.com
Mie Yim is a New York City based painter. Solo exhibitions include Villa Magdalena, San Sebastian, Spain, Olympia Gallery, New York, NY, the Durst foundation in New York, NY, Ground Floor Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, Lehmann Maupin, NY, Michael Steinberg, NY, Gallery in Arco, Turin, Italy. She had a solo exhibition at Brattleboro Museum in Brattleboro, Vermont in 2022. Numerous group exhibitions include Canada Gallery, the Drawing Center, Feature, Ise Cultural Foundation, Mitchell Algus Gallery, BRIC, Mark Borghi Gallery, all in New York. Other places such as Johnson County Community College, and the Weatherspoon Art Museum, Marcia Wood Gallery, Atlanta, The Arts Center at Western Conn. University. She represented a solo booth at NADA 2021 with Olympia and a 3 person presentation at Untitled 2021 with Monica King Projects. She is a recipient of Pollock Krasner Foundation Grant in 2020, The Lillian Orlowsky and William Freed Grant 2018, The New York Foundation of the Arts Painting Fellowship in 2021 and 2015 and Artist in the Market Place, Bronx Museum. She has a BFA in Painting from Philadelphia College of Art as well as a year abroad at Tyler School of Art in Rome, Italy. She will have solo exhibitions at Olympia Gallery, Simone Subal Gallery in New York, and Inna Art Space in Hangzhou, China in 2023. mieyim.com
Kim Brandt, Irving Sandler Award Recipient
Kim Brandt's work has been presented by MoMA/PS1, MCA Chicago, The Kitchen, SculptureCenter, Pioneer Works, Issue Project Room, Bric, The Shed, Artists Space, Klaus Von Nichtssagend Gallery and AVA Gallery, among others. Her work has been supported by grants and fellowships from Princeton University, Foundation for Contemporary Arts, NYFA, Jerome Foundation and Brooklyn Arts Fund, and she has been an Artist in Residence at Chinati Foundation, MoMA/PS1, Djerassi, Movement Research, Bogliasco Foundation, Issue Project Room, and the Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program. Her writing has been published by The Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art Journal, Chinati Foundation, Sound American and Critical Correspondence. kimbrandt.net