Hex & Primordial Soup: Jagger Van Vliet’s Highlights

 
By JAGGER VAN VLIET, November 8, 2026

I was standing on Wyckoff Avenue, just outside Hala Coffee at exactly 7:13 pm. It was raining slightly and the artists I was mingling with had all taken cover, protecting a solid rotation of good weed and cigarettes. Tall boys were the fuel of choice for this crowd so I knew there was a busy night ahead. I had two galleries to hit, both around four blocks from each other, and judging by the crowd inside, Hala was the unofficial starting point for everyone’s night.

Inside, along a brick interior, I found works for a group show titled “Hex.” It’s never too late for the occult, and even a week after Halloween, these works were all eerie ruminations on transforming and subverting. You had a neat oil piece by Andy Marlowe, depicting a split-screen of Liz Renay and a vintage fork. Marlowe and I had both worn a black maxi-skirt and matching top, a fit we agreed was sure to become the new nonbinary uniform.
 

String Game (Blue) 2026, Oil on canvas 21" x 21"
 

I also saw Eduardo Joaquin’s piece “String Game (Blue).” Under a pale blue wash, Joaquin rendered five hands pinching the vertices of an electric blue pentagram. At the center of it all was a delicate sliver of moon illuminating a cloudy sky in a ghostly, argent light.

Eventually, the crowd began a drizzly trek to Hart Street, where The Sue Tear Gallery promised still more weirdness. On the walk, I caught up with Lindaluz Carrillo, who told me she was in the process of gathering materials in preparation for her upcoming residence in Virginia.

Never let anyone tell you that the art world isn’t still exciting in 2026. Just to enter The Sue Tear I had to wander down a grisly corridor, barely lit, with a door laid across the floor as a makeshift ramp. It felt like one of those house shows they hold out in Boston; a subterranean den harboring future rockstars.  
 

Entrance to The Sue Tear
 

In the case of “Primordial Soup,” the artists seemed to be going for a real GG Allin vibe. Once you made it past the hallway of horrors, the gallery was filled with works that ranged from grotesque to downright gory. A sculpture by Alex Ehmer sat tucked in an alcove, and displayed a single anatomical spine model, slathered in wax jelly viscera.

It seemed only natural to me that one of Brooke Schneider’s ceramics would make an appearance. Schneider’s dimpled tangles of branches looked like the remnants of some long-extinct megaflora. Similarly, Dylan Teaford’s hydrostone Gypsum relief appeared plucked from an alternate timeline archaeological dig.

The absolute peak for the evening was Jordan Segal’s “The Butcher.” Good God this thing was gloriously freaky. Segal listed the materials simply as “mixed media,” probably for the best; some things are better left unexplained, particularly the dimly horrifying tangle of nails and what looked suspiciously like blood-soaked spiderwebs. Here was one of those sculptures where you couldn’t look away, even as the hair on the back of your neck stood straight up. If this overgrown amoebic tumor wasn’t the very picture of primordial soup, I’m not sure what was.
 

The Butcher, 2020 Mixed media 34" x 24" x 10"
 

I really do get a kick out of these house-show-type, DIY galleries. When I left The Sue Tear, the rain was still coming down and I was thinking about rockstars. You could get anyone into art, if it felt like a basement show on the verge of a police bust. Anyone who cares about the future of art might be wise to start practicing their two-step. Okay, that’s all for now. Over and out.