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Cultural Center Jacob Miller, Executive Director

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For Immediate Release May 6, 2026

Athens Cultural Center opens Animal Bodies: The Works of Elana Herzog, Jean Shin, and Brigitta Váradi, on view June 5 through August 16

The Athens Cultural Center is pleased to announce Animal Bodies: The Works of Elana Herzog, Jean Shin, and Brigitta Váradi, a new exhibition opening June 5, 2026, with a First Friday reception from 5–7pm. The show runs through August 16.

Curated by Yasmeen Siddiqui of Minerva Projects, Animal Bodies brings together three artists whose practices are rooted in materials, textile design and manufacturing, as well as in deep relationships between wild and settled worlds. Though each artist is known for expansive, panoramic work, this exhibition offers visitors a rare opportunity to encounter their approaches at an intimate scale.

"Beyond archiving relationships among the primordial and artifice, the works here posit new expressions of how animals might live with landscapes." - Yasmeen Siddiqui, Minerva Projects

Elana Herzog travels widely, from her family's Catskill home to Central Asia and beyond, collecting fabrics and patterns that she cuts, splices, weaves, and staples, unsettling the embedded structures and pathways that order space and attachment. Brigitta Váradi collaborates with sheep farmers in Ireland and the Hudson Valley, tracing the ways humans and flocks attend to one another and to the land they share. Jean Shin excavates the stories of Hemlock trees in the Hudson Valley and of New York City's oyster banks, following and

reconfiguring raw materials — once made into satchels and mother-of-pearl buttons — as they move through time and environment.

"Herzog, Shin, and Váradi invite us to consider how fiber — as practice, process, and material — becomes a living record of the entanglements between human making and the natural world. Each artist works at the place where land, labor, and creature meet, offering not nostalgia for lost connections but an active reimagining of how we might dwell more attentively within the landscapes that sustain us."- Rebecca Hart, ACC President

The exhibition opens June 5 with a First Friday reception, free and open to the public, from 5–7pm at the ACC, 24 Second Street, Athens, NY. An Artist and Curator Talk with Yasmeen Siddiqui and all the artists takes place on June 26, 5–7pm. The exhibition will also be open during Upstate Art Weekend, June 27 and 28, with expanded hours of 11am–6pm.

Gallery hours are Saturday and Sunday, 12–5pm, with additional First Friday openings on July 3 and August 7, 5–7pm. Admission is always free.

Please visit athensculturalcenter.org for more information.

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Exhibition Details

June 5 – August 16, 2026 Animal Bodies: The Works of Elana Herzog, Jean Shin, and Brigitta Váradi Curated by Yasmeen Siddiqui of Minerva Projects. Gallery hours: Saturday & Sunday, 12–5pm. Free and open to the public.

First Fridays June 5, July 3, August 7, 5–7pm Monthly opening receptions with sips, bites, and conversation. Come see the exhibition, connect with artists and neighbors, and hear what's new at the ACC. Free and open to all.

Artist & Curator Talk June 26, 5–7pm Join curator Yasmeen Siddiqui and the artists for a conversation about the exhibition's themes: textile, territory, ecology, and the lives of animals and humans in shared landscapes.

Upstate Art Weekend June 27 & 28 — 11am–6pm The ACC participates in Upstate Art Weekend with expanded gallery hours. Plan a visit and explore the Hudson Valley's vibrant arts community.

24 Second Street, Athens NY 12015 | athensculturalcenter.org | 518.945.2136