NXTHVN Cohort 06

James Cohan and NXTHVN are pleased to present The Things Left Unsaid, a group exhibition that explores interconnected questions of belonging, adaptation, absence, and resilience. The exhibition will be on view at James Cohan’s Grand Street location from May 8 to June 21, 2025. This culminating exhibition features the work of NXTHVN’s Cohort 06 Studio Fellows Baris Gokturk, Kwamé Azure Gomez, Patrick Henry, Kristy Hughes, Christopher Paul Jordan, Reeha Lim, and Napoles Marty, curated by Curatorial Fellow Rigoberto Luna. James Cohan will host an opening reception on Thursday, May 8 from 6-8 PM. An artist panel will take place on May 29 from 6-8 PM.

Utilizing wood, repurposed objects, process-based paintings on traditional and nontraditional surfaces, and mixed media installations, the artists navigate boundaries of perception and redefine space by examining the physical and emotional relationships with their environments. Formal gestures, concealment, and strategic omissions prompt viewers to engage with the unspoken narratives shaping our world. Through abstraction and material transformation, the artists reclaim agency and emphasize unspeakable and unresolved aspects within their subjects, inviting reflection on how personal experiences influence our understandings of history, culture, spirituality, and memory.

The Things Left Unsaid showcases each artist’s distinct process while tracing the connective threads of transformation. Baris Gokturk fragments and layers historical documents and archival imagery onto canvas, revealing charged ambiguities where personal memory and collective political history collide. Kwamé Azure Gomez navigates the emotional and psychological terrain of migration through expressive abstract paintings, allowing what cannot be fully seen or articulated to linger. Gestural marks become proof of existence. By rearticulating everyday objects into sculptural, metaphorically layered forms, Patrick Henry reinterprets mythical and social Haitian narratives by constructing meaning from what is built, broken, and becoming. Kristy Hughes transforms overlooked and discarded quotidian materials into vibrant voluminous sculptures that reclaim joy and identity, rooted in her personal history of invisibility. Christopher Paul Jordan hijacks conservation techniques, extracting and re-embedding murals to reveal how loss transforms and what history cannot hold. Reeha Lim’s large-scale silk paintings engage the body’s negotiation of architectural boundaries, highlighting themes of displacement through spatial interventions. Lastly, Napoles Marty channels memory and myth through carved, charred figures that blur reality and fiction in his representations of cultural symbols and rituals. Collectively, these artists create a space for contemplation, where absence speaks and the unspoken is registered through material presence.

NXTHVN is a national arts model that empowers artists and curators through education and access to avibrant ecosystem. Supported by intergenerational mentorship, cross-sector collaboration and local engagement, NXTHVN accelerates the careers of the next generation and fosters retention of professional art talent while helping catalyze New Haven into a world-class, sustainable arts community. 

Founded by Titus Kaphar and Jason Price, NXTHVN offers one of the only Fellowships that unites curators and artists, furnishing them with fundamentals to thrive in their practice. During the course of the program, Curatorial Fellows receive a $45,000 stipend and Studio Fellows receive a $35,000 stipend for the Fellowship year, 24-hour access to dedicated work and/or studio space and subsidized on-site housing. The program culminates in a group exhibition at a prominent gallery, situating Fellows squarely in the art world.

Since 2019, NXTHVN’s Fellowship program has served as a springboard for artist careers. Notable individuals who have completed the NXTHVN Fellowship include Felipe Baeza, Layo Bright, Kenturah Davis, Alexandria Smith, Vaughn Spann, Patrick Quarm, and many more.