Master of Puppets

Presented by LAND (League Artists Natural Design) in collaboration with The Museum of Modern Art Access Programs
Facilitated by Teaching Artist Rebecca Goyette and Curator Matthew Bede Murphy

Since 2009, LAND Gallery—a dynamic studio and exhibition space for adult artists with developmental disabilities based in DUMBO, Brooklyn—has partnered with MoMA’s Access Programs to forge an inclusive, experimental, and deeply human creative exchange. This ongoing collaboration fosters artistic growth through new media explorations, while engaging LAND artists with MoMA’s collection, exhibitions, and contemporary art discourse.

Masters of Puppets, the latest outcome of this partnership, highlights a yearlong series of workshops led by artist-educator Rebecca Goyette and LAND curator Matthew Bede Murphy. The project invited LAND artists to translate their rich cast of drawn and painted characters into soft sculpture and performative video, expanding their practices into the realms of dimensionality, movement, and storytelling.

Known for their vivid mark-making, imaginative symbology, and personal mythologies, the LAND artists were challenged to bring their characters off the page and into tangible form. Beginning with sketches and favorite motifs—whimsical robots, towering ladies’ boots, heavy metal musicians, and hybrid animal figures—each artist developed patterns to construct large-scale soft sculptures. These fabric works were sewn, stuffed, painted, and adorned with embellishments ranging from glittering rhinestones to human hair, transforming the studio into a kaleidoscopic workshop of fantastical forms. One sculpture stretched over six feet long; another reached beyond waist height. For many, the act of holding their creations—like Jonathan Putz hugging his soft-sculpted Miss Piggy—became a powerful moment of connection between fantasy and form.

The second phase of the project shifted into video and performance. Inspired by Goyette’s own background in costumed performance and character work, artists created puppet shows using painted backdrops, handmade lunch-bag puppets, and minimal stagecraft. While traditional puppet theater often hides the performer, the LAND artists subverted this convention—choosing instead to foreground the puppeteer, allowing their presence to become a visible, active part of the artwork. In doing so, they claimed space not only as creators, but as performers of their own narratives.

Masters of Puppets is a celebration of artistic agency, accessibility, and imaginative risk-taking. It foregrounds the creative voices of LAND artists while demonstrating the possibilities that emerge when art-making is rooted in play, embodiment, and inclusion.