Wafaa Bilal to Give Visiting Artist Lecture at Washington University

Catwalk Institute is proud to share that Wafaa Bilal (Catwalk 2007, SAIC) will deliver the Henry L. and Natalie E. Freund Visiting Artist Lecture at Washington University in St. Louis on October 15, 2026. Bilal, an Iraqi-born artist and professor at NYU Tisch, is internationally known for performative and interactive works that examine international politics, displacement, surveillance, cultural destruction, and the relationship between the United States and Iraq. The lecture is part of the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts Public Lecture Series and is free and open to the public. Sam Fox School

October 15, 2026 · 11:30 AM
Kuehner Court, Weil Hall
Washington University in St. Louis
Free and open to the public Sam Fox School

Project image: Rendering of Canto III, 2023, courtesy of the artist, used by WashU for the lecture announcement.

WashU — Visiting Artist Lecture details
Wafaa Bilal — artist website
NYU Tisch — Wafaa Bilal faculty profile

Taro Masushio at Art Week Tokyo 2026

Catwalk Institute proudly shares news from Taro Masushio (Catwalk 2014, NYU), who will be featured in Art Week Tokyo’s 2026 AWT Focus alongside Belgian artist Sophie Nys. Curated by Olivier Mignon, the exhibition at XYZ Collective brings together Masushio’s photography and video with Nys’s sculpture to explore the relationships between body, image, language, sexuality, and the politics of the gaze. Art Week Tokyo runs November 4–8, 2026, with AWT Focus presenting ten specially curated projects across Tokyo. Masushio is also currently included in The Drawing Center’s 2026 Benefit Auction, where his 2026 photogravure Remove the Eye #2 is available for bidding through October 14. Art Week Tokyo

Art Week Tokyo / AWT Focus
November 4–8, 2026
XYZ Collective
2-13-4-B02 Sugamo, Toshima-ku, Tokyo
Taro Masushio & Sophie Nys, curated by Olivier Mignon. Art Week Tokyo

Drawing Center Benefit Auction
Remove the Eye #2, 2026
Bidding closes October 14 at noon ET.
Starting bid: $3,200. Drawing Center Auctions

Artist image: I looked specifically for a current portrait but did not find a reliable recent headshot. I would use a current work/project image rather than substitute an old or unrelated portrait. The Art Week Tokyo page has current Masushio imagery, including Untitled (Youth #1) and Untitled 3. Art Week Tokyo

Art Week Tokyo — Taro Masushio & Sophie Nys
The Drawing Center — Remove the Eye #2 auction
Taro Masushio — Ulrik artist page

Stephanie Wambugu — Lonely Crowds at Brattleboro Museum & Art Center

Catwalk Institute proudly shares news from Stephanie Wambugu (Catwalk 2025, Columbia), whose debut novel Lonely Crowds continues its strong reception with a featured discussion at the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center on October 22. The novel follows Ruth and Maria, two women whose intense friendship begins in childhood and eventually carries them into New York's 1990s art world. Lonely Crowds has been named a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree, won the Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction, and was a finalist for the Barnes & Noble Discover Prize and NYPL Young Lions Fiction Award. Wambugu will discuss the novel as part of BMAC Reads, moderated by Elizabeth Catlin.

Thursday, October 22, 2026 · 5:30–7:30 PM
Brattleboro Museum & Art Center
10 Vernon Street, Brattleboro, Vermont
$0–$10 · Advance registration required

Nansi T. Lent — A Thread of Longing: Works from 1976–2026

Nansi T. Lent

Catwalk Institute proudly shares news about Nansi T. Lent (Catwalk 2018, NYU), whose exhibition, A Thread of Longing: Works from 1976–2026, opens this week at BAU Gallery in Beacon, New York. The exhibition brings together about 20 works spanning more than five decades, tracing Lent’s movement from figurative and narrative painting to recent abstractions that incorporate tally marks, repeated gestures, glyphs, layered color, and asemic writing. The exhibition considers longing, memory, communication, prayer, and the search for connection and meaning. BAU Gallery

October 9–November 8, 2026
BAU Gallery
506 Main Street
Beacon, New York

Opening reception: Saturday, October 10 · 6–8 PM
Gallery hours: Friday 4–7 PM; Saturday & Sunday 12–6 PM; and by appointment.

Ayoung Yu & Nicholas Oh’s AYDO at Harvard’s Carpenter Center

Ayoung Yu & Nicholas Oh

Catwalk Institute proudly shares news from Ayoung Yu (Catwalk 2020, Columbia), whose collaborative practice with Nicholas Oh, AYDO, is currently featured in Knowledge Is Myth: Chimeric Continuities at Harvard University’s Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts in Cambridge. On view October 1–December 13, 2026, the exhibition brings together artists exploring mythmaking as a way of constructing and questioning knowledge, drawing on pre-colonial, diasporic, and chimeric traditions. AYDO’s multidisciplinary practice examines cultural inheritance, colonial histories, and eco-spirituality. The exhibition opened with an artist talk featuring AYDO on October 1 and is free and open to the public. CCVA

October 1–December 13, 2026
Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts
24 Quincy Street, Cambridge, MA
Free and open to the public
Open Tuesday–Sunday, 12–5 PM. CCVA

Artist photo: AYDO portrait of Ayoung Yu and Nicholas Oh, from the Asian American Arts Alliance.

Carpenter Center — Knowledge Is Myth: Chimeric Continuities
Artist talk and opening reception information

Ivelisse Jiménez’s Campo de Resonancia at CAMi

Ivelisse Jiménez

Catwalk Institute proudly shares news from Ivelisse Jiménez (Catwalk 2013, NYU), whose large-scale installation Campo de Resonancia is currently on view at the Contemporary Art Museum of Indianapolis (CAMi) through January 17, 2027. Created for CAMi’s inaugural exhibition program, the immersive installation uses hand-painted transparent and colored vinyl together with reclaimed plastics collected from Indianapolis residents. Jiménez transforms discarded materials into a permeable labyrinth that asks visitors to move through layers of light, color, material, and memory. The work considers the contradiction between plastic’s usefulness and its environmental consequences while proposing sustained looking as a form of resistance. Admission is free. Big Car

Through January 17, 2027
Jeremy Efroymson Gallery, CAMi
1125 Cruft Street, Indianapolis, Indiana
Free admission
Wednesday–Friday and weekends; closed Monday and Tuesday. Indianapolis Art Museum

Artist photo: Current installation photograph of Jiménez in the CAMi gallery, courtesy of the Contemporary Art Museum of Indianapolis.

Project image: CAMi provides current documentation of Campo de Resonancia. Big Car

CAMi — Ivelisse Jiménez: Campo de Resonancia
CAMi events and visiting information

Moara Passoni: New HBO Series and International Recognition

Moara Passoni

Moara Passoni's My Mother Is a Cow (Minha Mãe É uma Vaca).

official film poster

Moara Passoni’s Democracia Corinthiana — HBO Max
Cast of the new series

Catwalk Institute proudly welcomes filmmaker Moara Passoni back into the spotlight with news of her latest projects. Passoni has created and co-written Democracia Corinthiana, a new eight-part HBO Max series inspired by the extraordinary movement at Brazil's Corinthians football club during the final years of the military dictatorship. She serves as creator and head writer and shares directing duties with Maria Farkas. Her 2024 short film My Mother Is a Cow, which premiered at the Venice Film Festival, has also received a Gea Special Mention at the 2026 Tabaca Film Fest in Spain. Together, these projects continue Passoni's exploration of history, politics, family, and the forces that shape individual lives.

Rosanne Limoncelli’s Thriller “The Spiral” Coming October 27

Catwalk Institute proudly shares news from Rosanne Limoncelli (Catwalk 2025, NYU/Tisch), whose new thriller The Spiral will be published October 27 by Crooked Lane Books. Set in 1979 Greenwich Village, the novel follows nineteen-year-old Nina Esposito, a bartender whose life changes when a serial killer begins targeting women who look like her. The Spiral launches a new thriller series for Limoncelli, following the July release of Death at King’s Cross, the second novel in her Four Queens of Crime series. With its gritty New York setting and psychological suspense, The Spiral offers a new direction for the Catwalk alum’s growing body of fiction.

Pre-order / book information — Penguin Random House

Grace DeGennaro — Eternal Forms

Catwalk Institute proudly shares news from alumna Grace DeGennaro, who was in residence at Catwalk in 2017. DeGennaro’s new exhibition, Eternal Forms, is currently on view at Cove Street Arts in Portland, Maine, through November 7, 2026. The exhibition features new paintings and works on paper exploring geometry, pattern, ritual, growth, and the passage of time. Drawing on the symbolic relationships between circles, squares, axes, and the geometric structures of Tibetan mandalas and Renaissance architecture, DeGennaro creates works that connect Eastern and Western visual traditions. An artist talk will be held October 15 at 6 PM.

Eternal Forms
September 17–November 7, 2026
Cove Street Arts
71 Cove Street, Portland, Maine
Artist Talk: October 15, 6 PM

View the exhibition at Cove Street Arts
Grace DeGennaro — Artist Website

JUDD MORRISSEY & MARK JEFFERY: THE PORCH AS A STAGE

A porch can be a threshold, a gathering place, a place to watch the world—or a stage.

That idea sits at the heart of Leopold Benches: A P(o)or(t)ch Theater, the latest project from longtime collaborators Judd Morrissey and Mark Jeffery, both 2005 Catwalk Institute alumni. Created with the Poor Farm Experiment, the work brings together stereoscopic photography and live performance to explore ideas of community, generosity, and shared space.

Following its September presentation at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the project continues its Chicago presence this fall as part of programming connected to SAIC Galleries.

Learn more: Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago
Affiliation: School of the Art Institute of Chicago

#catwalkinstitute #juddmorrissey #markjeffery #performanceart #contemporaryart

Michelle Inez Hinojosa & Barbara Pearsall: Under the Tent: Whirling & Flickering

We’re excited to see the collaboration between Catwalk artists Michelle Inez Hinojosa and Barbara Pearsall continue to grow following their time together at Catwalk. Their residency helped prepare the work for their first collaborative exhibition, Under the Tent: Whirling & Flickering, now on view at the John and June Allcott Gallery at UNC Chapel Hill.

One of the things we love most about Catwalk is bringing artists together and creating space for unexpected connections and collaborations to develop. We’re thrilled to see Michelle and Barbara’s work continue beyond their residency and to see the results of that collaboration come to life.

Exhibition: Under the Tent: Whirling & Flickering
Location: John and June Allcott Gallery, UNC Chapel Hill
On view: August 20–October 15, 2026

Catwalk Artist Residency Featured in Vassar Quarterly

Catwalk Institute proudly welcomes the Summer 2026 issue of Vassar Quarterly, featuring Catwalk Artist Residency in “The Luxury of Time and Space.”

The feature explores what happens when artists are given something increasingly rare: uninterrupted time, space, and freedom to focus on their creative work. The article highlights Catwalk’s history and mission, including founder Purcell Scheu Palmer’s vision of creating a place where artists could step away from everyday pressures and immerse themselves in their practices. It also profiles five Catwalk artists and their experiences at the residency: writer Emily Ludolph, visual artist Spence Holman, actor and writer Shona Tucker, animator and interdisciplinary artist Jacob Rivkin, and choreographer and performance artist Josie Bettman. Together, their stories offer a portrait of the creative community, experimentation, and lasting impact that Catwalk makes possible.

Read “The Luxury of Time and Space” in Vassar Quarterly.

Read the Vassar Quarterly feature

Illustration by Brian Stauffer

Taleen Mardirossian’s Essay Published in Sunday Long Read

Catwalk Institute is proud to celebrate the publication of Taleen Mardirossian’s essay, The Mother Tongue of All Secrets, in Sunday Long Read.

The essay began during Taleen’s residency at Catwalk, following the death of her grandmother. During her time at the residency, she found the space, time, and community to begin processing that difficult moment through writing. From sharing an early draft with fellow artists and reading the work aloud at Catwalk to presenting it to members of the Catwalk board, the residency became an important part of the essay’s development. We are thrilled to see this deeply personal work now reaching a wider audience and grateful that Catwalk could play a small part in its journey.

Read Taleen’s essay, The Mother Tongue of All Secrets, in Sunday Long Read.

https://sundaylongread.com/2026/09/12/the-mother-tongue-of-all-secrets/

Paul McAdory in THE PARIS REVIEW

Paul McAdory’s new essay, “If You Build It, Will They Come? On the Sperm Racing World Cup,” has been published in The Paris Review.

In the piece, McAdory follows the strange and increasingly public world of competitive sperm racing, tracing the spectacle through questions of science, masculinity, performance, self-optimization, and the attention economy. What begins as an investigation into an improbable new sport becomes a sharp and personal meditation on production, anxiety, and the sometimes uneasy relationship between making something and finding an audience.

Read the essay: The Paris Review

Emily Janowick’s "Long Walk" Opens at SUNY Purchase

Catwalk Institute is pleased to share that artist Emily Janowick will open her solo exhibition, Long Walk, on August 26, 2026, at the Richard and Dolly Maass Gallery at SUNY Purchase College. Long Walk reflects on mortality, grief, transformation, and the ways life persists through change. The exhibition is the culmination of Janowick’s time as the Windgate Artist in Residence at SUNY Purchase.

Opening Reception: August 26, 2026, 6–8 PM
Richard and Dolly Maass Gallery, SUNY Purchase College
Purchase, New York

Adin Dobkin, Announces New Book

Adin Dobkin

Catwalk Institute is pleased to share the forthcoming publication of These Bones Can Speak: A Border Fable of the Progressive Era by Catwalk alum Adin Dobkin, coming January 26, 2027, from Little A.

Dobkin’s new work of narrative nonfiction explores the life of José Tomás Canales, a Tejano legislator who, in 1919, undertook an investigation into the Texas Rangers and their violence along the U.S.-Mexico border. Moving between political biography, border history, and historical essay, These Bones Can Speak examines the intertwined histories of land, labor, reform, political power, and state violence—and asks difficult questions about how individuals respond when confronted with deeply entrenched injustice.

The book grew from years of archival research and an evolving effort to understand Canales: what compelled him to challenge the Rangers, the forces that shaped his decisions, and the limits of political reform. Dobkin describes the result as an intentionally hybrid work that follows his own process of historical discovery.

These Bones Can Speak will be published January 26, 2027. The book is available for preorder through major booksellers, including Bookshop.org.

Learn more about Adin Dobkin and the book:
Adin Dobkin

Kelsey Shwetz at Winston Wächter Fine Art in New York

Catwalk Institute is excited to see alumna Kelsey Shwetz included in Let’s Escape the Ordinary, a group exhibition curated by Natasha Schlesinger at Winston Wächter Fine Art in New York. The exhibition brings together eleven artists whose work explores landscapes, dreams, possibilities, and ways of stepping beyond the ordinary. Shwetz’s paintings explore abstraction emerging from the observed world and the experience of occupying multiple spaces at once.

Let’s Escape the Ordinary
Winston Wächter Fine Art
530 W 25th Street, New York, NY
July 22–August 28, 2026

View the exhibition at Winston Wächter Fine Art

Daphne Kalotay’s Blue Hours Coming to Audiobook

Catwalk Institute is delighted to celebrate the upcoming audiobook release of Daphne Kalotay’s award-winning novel Blue Hours, arriving September 1 and performed by AudioFile “Golden Voice” narrator Julia Whelan. We’re always proud to see the work of Catwalk artists reach new audiences, and Kalotay’s “spellbinding” (Booklist) mystery is a wonderful example of the lasting impact of their creative work. Linking early-90s Manhattan with northeastern Afghanistan in 2012, Blue Hours centers intrepid women in a “rich and layered” (Boston Globe) story exploring America’s role in a conflicted and interconnected world.